LAND OF THE DEAD: REVIEW

LAND OF THE DEAD (2005)

Director:

George A. Romero

Stars:

John Leguizamo, Asia Argento ,Simon Baker and Dennis Hopper

It has taken 20 years for Romero to finally make a new Zombie film, not that he didn’t have something to say, but that no one was offering him financing.  Finally, Universal Pictures came forth and gave Romero the financing he needed to get his long awaited fourth zombie movie off the ground.  This would mark the first time a Romero zombie film would be financed with a major film corporation and that meant that Romero, long an independent rebel, would have to compromise and work under the umbrella of a company with demands. 

The result is a sleek looking and the biggest budgeted Romero zombie film ever.  But he had to cast some recognizable names such as Dennis Hopper, John Leguizamo, and Simon Baker to help draw in an audience.  Using known actors immediately tosses out the realism of Romero’s work.  In the past, the unknown casts have helped to create an “anybody” feel to the movie as if it was really happening to normal, everyday folk.  Now we feel like we are getting the Big Screen version of a real world event.

Land of the Dead also marks a sad departure of Tom Savini as Make -up FX creator.  The reasons for Romero and Savini’s separation is not known publically, but without Savini, Romero starts to rely on Computer Animation, something I despise and abhor.  Romero has gone on to say that Computer FX are easier and less time consuming, but he sacrifices a great deal of realism for this.

Land of the Dead takes place within a walled up city surrounded on three sides by water.  This is the perfect place to live while only having to protect one potential weak spot.  Simon Baker and John Leguizamo star as two men who work for Dennis Hopper, here a complete reversal from the Easy Rider days where he fought the Man and now has become the Man.  Hopper is in charge of the city and lives in a skyscraper with many other wealthy tenants.  Funny how money, power and glamour even plays a part in the world at this point with all that is happening, but Romero is creating a Have and Have Not situation.

Baker ‘s character Riley wants to leave the city and Leguizamo’s character Cholo feels he has earned himself a place in that tall tower to live like a king.  Both men decide this is their last trip out to fetch things, but during their trek they seem to “wake up” the zombies who are all just hanging around doing nothing.  The main zombie is referred to in credits as Big Daddy, and thankfully never in the film.  Bid Daddy represents a continuation of the Bub character from Day of the Dead.  Big Daddy has feelings, seems to remember parts of his previous life and soon leads a group of zombies on a journey toward the city.

The performances in this film are competent, but the story itself has a sort of déjà vu feeling to it.  Romero doesn’t seem to be covering any new ground.   The zombie make up isn’t as good as previous outings, and the zombies all seem to be a bit too human in their actions.  I miss the dazed and confused look they use to have.

This film has lots of gore, which was toned down for the theatrical release, but put back for the DVD release. 

Romero has changed in 20 years, as most people will, and Land is not a bad movie, it’s just we don’t get that commentary that we got from the previous three films, and when Romero is trying to say something he is less subtle about his messages and more in your face as if he doesn’t trust his audience to read between the lines.  This isn’t a film about ego, or gender roles or infighting, it’s basically just a horror film to entertain, and it does entertain.

Sadly, Romero would follow this up with two more zombie films, Diary of the Dead and Survival of the Dead, two movies which would prove that the creator and master of the zombie genre had lost his way.

GRADE: B

STONE; Robert DeNiro Review

STONE (2010)

Director:

John Curran

Writer:

Angus MacLachlan

Stars:

Edward Norton, Milla Jovovich and Robert De Niro

Stone is the movie of two men on opposite sides of the law and their journey toward redemption and moral bankruptcy.  Edward Norton plays Gerald “Stone” Creeson, up for parole 8 years into a 10-15 year sentence for accessory to murder and arson involving his grandparents.  Robert DeNiro plays Jack Mabry, the Parole Officer who is responsible for seeing if Stone deserves to be paroled.

The first scene in the film takes place during the late 1960’s, and shows a younger Mabry sitting in front of a TV watching golf and drinking.  His wife, Madylyn enters the room and musters the strength to tell Jack she has had it with him.  Jack runs upstairs and holds their daughter out of a window and threatens to drop her if Madylyn ever thinks of leaving him again.  This scene serves to show the audience that Jack has demons and it was probably at this moment when he lost his way.

Now in present day Stone is marched into Mabry’s office, hair in corn rows and speaking with a scratchy southern “wigger” accent.  Norton does a great job of embodying this character.  Their first meeting is one of annoyance and frustration.  Jack is close to retirement and is just seeing his current cases through, while Stone is tired of having to keep talking about his crimes and such again and again in order to just be denied parole.  Mabry makes it known that he is the only “door” that Stone may walk through.  So the two men go about having conversations that seem more like therapy sessions than interviews.

Milla Jovovich plays Lucetta Creeson, Stone’s wife of nine years.  She is innocent yet has a dark side which Milla skillfully plays.  Stone puts her up to getting a hold of Jack and trying to “convince” him that he should be paroled.  She immediately sets out to do this, using her sweet tone and understated sexuality. Mabry , at first, resists her but soon finds himself meeting with her privately and ultimately engaging in an affair.

During this game of cat and mouse, Stone starts to have an epiphany about God, about life and about his crimes.  He starts reading up and soon begins to evolve spiritually.  This evolution plays against Jack’s moral decline as he cheats on his wife and continues to ignore her more and more. 

The whole film is set in the Bible Belt and throughout the film there is religious radio call in chatter used as a sort of random narration.   At one point Jack sits with the Pastor and tells him he should just shoot him.  Jack is unhappy and always has been, but lately he is starting to feel like his actions, his retirement and Stone are making him feel cornered.

So the film creates the spiritual evolution of a criminal while it shows the spiritual decline and moral bankruptcy of the non-criminal.  And although Stone may have used his wife to help secure his release, his desire changes as his spiritual growth does.  This change leaves Jack suspicious and Lucetta confused.

Stone gets his parole and Jack retires, but is so lost and confused that he drunkenly hits on his female replacement and when she politely refuses he calls her a cunt.  Jack leaves the bar where his retirement celebration is happening and he finds Stone.  Jack puts a gun up to Stone’s jaw, but Stone says, “You won’t do it.”  Jack wants to, and the scene shows just how far gone Jack is, but Jack doesn’t do it. He goes back home.

Once back home Jack is awaken in the middle of the night to a fire consuming his home.  He wakes up his wife and the two take refuge outside.  Jack believes that Stone did this, but Madylyn claims it was an act of God, but the suggestion her is that she’s had enough and she set the fire as a way to free herself from Jack and his isolating of her soul.

The film ends with Stone a changed man as is Madylyn a changed woman, but Jack and Lucetta both seem alone and lost.  The direct connotation here is that Stone and Madylyn believe in God and have faith whereas Jack and Lucetta do not and are lost souls.

The advertising for this film called it a taught thriller, and cat and mouse game, which it is not.  Stone is not really playing Jack for a fool as is suggested by other film synopsis of STONE.  He may have started out that way, but the film quickly isn’t about that, it’s truly about discovering God and that if you believe then you will be saved.  The film is slow, and there is almost zero tension, but the three stars give fine if not restrained performances.  The message here is not even remotely subtle and the film suffers a bit because of that.  Part of the problem with Stone, just like with DeNiro’s 2009 film “Everybody’s Fine” is that the two films are advertised as being a type of movie they are not.  Regardless of that Stone is a somewhat interesting character study about two men heading in different directions spiritually.

GRADE: B-

REJECTION: Sympathy for the Devil

re·jec·tion  (r-jkshn)

n.

1. The act of rejecting or the state of being rejected.

 

We all know it sucks to be rejected, especially when we dig deep down and realize that aren't responsible for the rejection. But of course there are always two sides to everything so we probably are somehow responsible.

 

But regardless, rejection hurts.  It hurts bad.  It even hurts when we're rejected by someone we rejected ourselves.  It burrows itself into the depths of our self esteem and makes us feel worthless as well as question why we're worthless.

 

Suddenly our entire self worth gets put into the controlling hands of the person or person's who rejected us.  We get so wrapped up in feeling rejected that we don't stop to think that maybe it's not us who has been judged, but the person doing the judging who has something going on in their lives that we project on ourselves.

 

When someone doesn't talk to us we ask, "what did I do?", but in fact it may be something going on within their lives that has taken them from talking to us.

 

And if someone does indeed reject us; its not immediately US who are the problem, but maybe the person who rejects us is the problem.  Maybe their own insecurities or judgemental attitudes are at fault.  We may be accepted!

 

The thing to remember is not to get wrapped up in someone's rejection of us.  Does their opinion define us?  Does their opinion really matter if they are judging us?  The only person who shall judge me besides judges and juries is my HIGHER POWER.

 

My entire self worth is not defined by one person, no  matter how much it hurts to be rejected by them. 

 

I won't give them that much power.  They do not deserve that much power.