"The Visit" Review

OP-ROB RATING: BENCH

M. Night Shyamalan must have some deep seeded fears and insecurities when it comes to the elderly. As it turns out, so do many other younger people. In his new movie, “The Visit”, Shyamalan plays to these inhibitions. Paula Jamison (Kathryn Hahn) hasn’t seen her parents since the day she stormed out on them and ran off with her boyfriend. Now several years later, her boyfriend has bailed on Paula and their two teenagers, Becca (Olivia DeJonge) and Tyler (Ed Oxenbould). Out of the blue, Paula’s parents have reached out and asked to meet Becca and Tyler. Tentatively, Paula has agreed to put the two on a train to rural Masonville, Pennsylvania to stay with her estranged parents for a few days. Hence we have “The Visit”.

The grandparents are John and Doris Jamison, (Peter McRobbie and Deanna Dunagan), and at first, they come off as a caring and simple old couple looking to start a relationship with their grandchildren. They greet the kids at the train station and head out to their old farmhouse all set for a week of bonding. A commanding feature of the film is that we see the tale unfold “found-footage” style. Becca, while only fifteen, has decided to shoot a documentary about the visit, hoping that the footage can provide some sort of healing “elixir” to her family situation.

Things start off well, however it is as early as the first night that the kids get their first dose of “old people” weirdness. Becca ventures out of her room past curfew seeking a late-night snack, and instead stumbles upon Doris who is pacing around beneath the staircase vomiting ferociously. Things get stranger the next day when Tyler explores a shed only to discover a massive pile of soiled diapers. When the kids tentatively ask about these occurrences John dismisses Doris’ episode citing the flu, and simply that “she’s an old woman”. Doris covers for John’s collection of diapers telling Tyler that he has “incontinence” and is embarrassed about it.

Shyamalan does well playing with the audiences feelings about old people. In general we understand how they can sometimes be sickly, or in some way a little strange albeit very warm and caring. The oddities of the story are believable enough within an old person stereotype right up until Shyamalan lays down his “twist” and all the eerie episodes makes sense. Shyamalan utilizes the “first-person” view to increase suspense, and make the scenes feel more enclosed and claustrophobic. While “The Visit” is a vast improvement compared to Shyamalan’s notorious streak of bombs including “The Happening”, “The Last Airbender” and “After Earth”, it still isn’t in the same ballpark as his earliest films due to the duo of ghastly teenagers played by DeJonge and Oxenbould and a weak supporting narrative.

Becca comes off as a hormonal dilettante and Tyler as a wannabe version of Soulja Boy, although he fancies himself more in the realm of Tyler the Creator. The fact that Becca finds it appropriate to make a documentary about first meeting her grandparents is ridiculous, and she extinguishes any likeability she has by saying things like “don’t touch it, let it swing naturally” when recording a shot of a swing. Tyler is equally unpalatable with his self-proclaimed rapper name “T-Diamond Stylus” and nauseating rhymes.

Behind the sturdy horror plot, Shyamalan inserts a “coming-of-age”/redemption element that never really secures footing. Somehow Becca and Tyler must face their demons regarding their absentee father and throughout the horrific unfolding of events in “The Visit”, they both find themselves. This ramshackle backstory is clichéd and ultimately an excuse for a sickening final act.

There are flashes of the genius that directed “The Sixth Sense” and “Signs” in several scenes throughout “The Visit”. These moments of true suspense and surprise are encouraging indications that Shyamalan may be returning to form. However, “The Visit” was equally as annoying as it was enthralling, and only noteworthy because of its director’s recent flops. 

"No Escape" Review

OP-ROB RATING: BENCH

The new thriller, “No Escape” opens with a bloody political assassination, perpetrated by rebels in red bandanas. Forget any explanation for this startling tip-off to the movie, because the director, John Erick Dowdle, winds back the clock a few hours and puts us on a plane with Jack and Annie Dwyer (Owen Wilson and Lake Bell) and their two daughters, Beeze and Lucy (Sterling Jergins and Claire Geare). This happy family of four is headed to Southeast Asia, where Jack has been hired as a water valve engineer by a water company called Cardiff. On the flight, Beeze drops her beloved stuffed animal below her seat where it is picked up and returned by Hammond, a mysterious guy with a tiger tooth necklace played by Pierce Brosnan. Upon arriving to the airport, Hammond helps the Dwyers’ navigate through the masses of Southeast Asians and even shares a bumpy bus ride with them to the Imperial Lotus Hotel, where they all happen to be staying.

Despite excellent reviews on Trip Advisor, the Imperial Lotus Hotel turns out to be not so imperial in its accommodations. Nothing in the room works, the concierge is utterly unhelpful, and Jack can’t get his hands on a U.S. newspaper that isn’t three days old. Perhaps he should have done a smidge of research before uprooting his family and moving to a country in Southeast Asia that is festering with poverty and clearly has an unstable government. However, we are not left any time to think about how absurd Jack’s situation is. Just as he begins to dig into his stale USA Today, hordes of feverishly mad Asians in red bandanas swarm the streets and he must escape back to the crummy hotel.

Jack pilots himself back to the Lotus as if he was a local and makes it just in time to get his family to the roof of the building. From this point the movie simply goes into one narrow and improbable escape after another. This formula is not uncommon, and has been used in gripping films such as Gareth Evans’ “The Raid: Redemption” and Alfonso Cuarón’s “Gravity”. In “The Raid”, Evans fills the space between his close calls with bone-crunching fist fights, Cuarón opts for insightful character development. In “No Escape” the filling is far less inventive. Jack tosses his daughters off of a roof and bludgeons a man to death with little contemplation, yet when there is a lull in the action he has an untimely panic attack in a far less intense situation. When the odds of survival are low enough, Dowdle employs Hammond, who pops into the movie at various moments just in time to shoot all of the bad guys. Between these less than thrilling sequences we are given motivational pep talks on family survival from Jack and Annie.

Hammond serves up the most pathetic piece of “No Escape”, when he reveals the reason for the government overthrow. Cardiff, the water company that hired Jack, is run by heartless capitalists who have been exploiting the ambiguous country of its labor and resources for years. Hammond explains how Cardiff moves into the region promising clean water facilities, and lures the common people into crippling debt in order to pay for the water. Now that Dowdle has proved his sentiment for poor Southeast Asians, he gets back to the poor Southeast Asians mercilessly trying to kill the rich white people.

True to its title, “No Escape” offers no escapism. The film seems to be running on fumes from the opening scenes. Owen Wilson and Lake Bell are admirable victims, yet there is nothing resembling an interesting plot to support them. It is hard to feel suspense when the basis of the situation is half-baked and Pierce Brosnan is always on deck to neutralize the threat. Owen Wilson and Lake Bell should know a late-summer dud when they see one, after an experience abroad like “No Escape”, they might do their research next time.

"The Man from U.N.C.L.E." Review

OP-ROB RATING: ALL-STAR

“The Man from U.N.C.L.E.” is the type of movie you go into expecting nothing. Guy Ritchie hasn’t directed anything in the past decade that has lived up to the distinctiveness of his first two hit films, “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels” and “Snatch”. The film’s two stars, Henry Cavill and Armie Hammer, aren’t exactly known for their exceptional acting but rather for their good looks. We’re talking about the star of “Man of Steel” and “The Lone Ranger” here, to put things in perspective. Rounding out the low expectations is the fact that this movie is based off of a TV series from the 1960s under the same name. However, Ritchie knows his cards and doesn’t try to bluff. He knows that he is dealing Henry Cavill and Armie Hammer, not theater experts like Michael Fassbender and Benedict Cumberbatch. Recognizing the capacity of his leads, Ritchie injects his subject material with lively screenplay and whole lot of style. The result is a surprising revival of a well beloved series.

The film opens with Roberta Flack’s “Compared to What” paired with a sparky montage of Cold War headlines and news reels and then immediately sends the audience to 1963, in the divided city of Berlin, Germany. Napoleon Solo (Henry Cavill), is an American agent tasked with extracting a woman named Gaby Teller (Alicia Vikander) from the communist side of the wall. Solo, an ex-army officer turned professional thief is the Americans top secret agent, serving his government in the field in order to avoid doing time in prison. Illya Kuryakin (Armie Hammer) is a freak athlete with a chip on his shoulder, and the Russians’ top secret agent. He is waiting for Solo on the other side of the wall with the sole mission of stopping him. Little do these two rivals know they will be forced into partnership by their governments in a joint U.S.-Soviet joint mission to save the world from a nuclear attack.

The aforementioned woman Gaby Teller, happens to have a father by the name of Dr. Udo Teller (Christian Berkel) who is a nuclear scientist with the ability to develop nuclear bombs with drastic simplicity. His knowledge could be utilized by any country or criminal organization in order to create a nuclear bomb. To the superpowers’ great dismay, Dr. Teller has gone missing, and is suspected to have been abducted by a radical faction. Ironically, Dr. Teller’s disappearance has forced the Americans and the Soviets to pool their resources in order to keep nuclear power amongst themselves. In order to find the doctor, Solo and Kuryakin are tasked with going undercover with Ms. Teller in order to link up with her estranged Uncle Rudi (Sylvester Groth) who may know his whereabouts.

Like many spy films, there are plenty of twists and turns throughout the story. What separates “U.N.C.L.E.” from any other movie of its category is how Ritchie incorporates snappy dialogue and an energizing attention to detail. One of the most appealing aspects of “The Man from U.N.C.L.E.” is Ritchie’s use of humor. There is a competitiveness between Solo and Kuryakin that provides several laughs, each trying to prove his country better with their respective nifty gadgets and nuanced fighting techniques. The levity in the dialogue prevents “U.N.C.L.E.” from taking itself too seriously. However, Ritchie also flashes a dark side at several points during the film. In one scene a torture specialist describes his disturbing childhood and delight in working in demented laborites for the Nazis during World War II. There is a nice balance to the film that keeps it light, but packs a punch when needed.

One of my favorite scenes came near the end of the film when Solo and Kuryakin are involved in the raid of a compound. Instead of wasting ten minutes documenting each and every stage of the raid, Ritchie compacts it into a one-minute sequence. Using sliding split screens to quickly flash through each stage, Ritchie saves time and creatively cuts through what would have been a long and boring scene.

At the beginning of his career, Guy Ritchie achieved validation by masterfully capturing the grittiness, absurdity, and humor of the underground criminal world of urban England. It has been a long time since Ritchie’s first two films, and he has since picked up a taste for finer things. While “The Man from U.N.C.L.E.” doesn’t have the brains of a Le Carre novel or the gravitas of a 007 flick, it is refreshing and fashionable spy thriller that breaks the mold in its competitive genre.