Mr. Brooks

Bluez' Fantastic Guest Review:

There's nothing I like better than a good, thriller, and "Mr. Brooks" had the makings of a terrific one: two excellent writers in director Bruce A. Evans and screenwriter Raynold Gideon ("Stand by Me", "Starman"), as well as a respected cast. This movie could have been a promising film but the picture pushes plausibility to the limit with a story that is almost laughable, using every gimmick and characters that are poorly explored.

The premise is intriguing. Earl Brooks (Costner) is Portland's "man of the year", successful, wealthy and married to beautiful Emma (Marg Helgenberger). This particular evening on his way home from a work related award he stops to buy ice cream for dessert. It's not because he has a sweet tooth, but because he's stalking a couple taking lessons at the dance school across the street. With his alter ego Marshall (William Hurt) — whom only we can see — egging him on, Brooks the serial killer is about to commit his first murder in two years. This is where I started to get doubtful about the movie, then I relaxed and started enjoying the banter between Costner and his alter-ego Hurt. Truly funny at times.

Having viewed his compulsion to kill as an "addiction", Brooks has been attending AA meetings for the past years, which have helped him keep his hobby under control. But Marshall's gives in to resistance which leads us to the scene of the crime. So far so good, even riveting, but this is when Evans and Gideon lose sense of logic and start introducing absurd twists.

It seems that a peeping Tom (Dane Cook) saw everything through the window, and took pictures to prove it. He approaches Brooks not to blackmail him for money, but to force him to take him along for the next kill, just for the thrill of it. Yeah, right. Dane, I love you and your stand up but you can't act for shit.

Then there's the brilliant police detective, Tracy (Demi Moore), who's not your average cop but a wealthy heiress who's undergoing a messy divorce with her latest husband (Jason Lewis) that's threatening her credibility in the force. Oh Please, bad casting here: this where I figured Marg and Demi should have switched roles to make the plot more believable.

In addition, a killer she put away has escaped from jail and is vowing revenge. If that wasn't enough, the "Thumbprint" Killer — as Brooks is known — is her latest assignment. For some reason, Earl is fascinated by Tracy and tries to help her out. Talking about coincidences, there are so many of them in "Mr. Brooks" that proceedings turn ridiculous.

One more thing. Brooks' daughter, Jane, comes home from college with plenty of lies. It becomes clear to Brooks that his compulsion is hereditary, so now he must decide whether to protect Jane or help her — which is not the same thing. This angle could have been further explored by the writers, as should the issue of compulsive and murderous behavior. Instead, characters never go deeper than originally introduced.

Too many sub-plots, too much going on however I did like Costner and Hurts acting and likeablity on film. One of the better efforts Costner has made in the last 10 years.

Demi- miscasted.
Marg- shoulda been the cop
Jane-(Danielle) good acting but I was pissed off at the end when it was a dream sequence ****sorry spoiler alert****
no one should have lived happily ever after.
Dane Cook- oye to the vey, go to acting class.

Despite its lush look and A-list stars, "Mr. Brooks" is little more than trash. Too bad, it had so much potential.

***1/2 out of *****

Green's Astounding Review:

On the surface, Earl Brooks (Costner) is a successful businessman, a generous philanthropist, a loving father, and a devoted husband. Just below the surface lies his dark secret - He, along with his alter-ego (Hurt) is the notorious Thumbprint Killer, who is known for rearranging the corpses of his victims into gratuitous sexual positions and leaving their bloody fingerprints in distinct places.

While committing his latest crime, the neurotic and normally thorough Brooks is unknowingly photographed by a nosy amateur photographer neighbor (Cook), who instead of going to the police with his pictures of the crime, decides he wants to accompany Mr. Brooks on his next murder, solely for the thrill of it. Brooks, wanting and trying to give up his life of crime, reluctantly agrees. Through this connection, Brooks discovers the identity of Tracy Atwood (Moore), the determined detective who is leading the investigation into the murders, while being extorted by her money grubbing ex-husband and his attorney, who are secret lovers.

Danielle Panabaker plays daughter Jane, a college dropout with issues of her own. Marg Helgenberger plays Emma, the devoted wife who is clueless to her husband's extracurricular activities and her daughter's growing addiction...

I thought this was a good, suspenseful movie with lots of promise. Costner is excellent as the normal-looking but creepily detached husband/killer. Hurt is amusing as the alter-ego. Helgenberger and Moore may have been better if their roles were switched, but perhaps if they were, this film would look too CSI-ish. Moore is adequate as the detective but hardly gives her best performance. Cook's character was annoying, perhaps purposefully so. He definitely needs more work on his acting skills.

There simply is too much going on to fully develop the characters and further develop the plot. For example - it's fine that Moore's character has a large net worth, but a little more detail would have been nice. How does Brooks acquire his split personality/alter ego? That information would have provided nice depth to the character. Why did the writers/director decide to use another actor as the alter-ego, instead of Costner dressed a different way? I think this adds unnecessary confusion in the beginning of the film when you're trying to get a handle on the characters and story.

I, like Bluez, was disappointed that the scissor sequence turned out to be a dream. That would have been a fitting end to the film considering how Brooks worries throughout the film about his daughter inheriting his lust for random killing.

Unfortunately a decent film stretched a little too thin.

*** out of *****

Scribe's-only-review-you should-lend-any-credence to:

Since both Bluez & Green have recapped the film in almost the exact same way twice, I shan't waste time on describing the plot or the characters yet again. Instead, I will focus on their reviews which are, especially in Bluez' case, in stark contrast to my own.

Simply put, this was one of the most refreshing takes on serial killers and their inner torment filmed in years. With the possible exception of the Showtime series "Dexter," Brooks breathes new life into a tired genre.

By presenting us with an oddly likable misfit protagonist, we are thrown into a whole new world as the workings of Earl Brooks' mind are laid bare for us to see. Costner is more than up to the challenge as the reluctant killer as is William Hurt as his alter-ego. The two of them together have a disturbingly original chemistry.

What sets Brooks apart from other serial killers is his ability to change his M.O. Instead of following a ritualistic killing style, he constantly reinvents himself so no one can pin him down. He is so successful at it that he intentionally allows himself to be seen by the peeping Tom who used to take pics of the screwing couple Brooks kills.

Enter Dane Cook as the Peeping Tom. At the risk of disagreeing completely with Bluez, this guy wouldn't know funny if it punted his family jewels into the air while cornholing him with a serrated kitchen knife. Dane Cook is quite possibly the lamest and most talent-less "comedian" ever. But, wonder of wonders, he is convincingly eerie as the would-be serial killer groupie Brooks allows to come with him on potential kills.

I didn't find Demi Moore miscast. It was nice to see she still knows how to be sexy in a movie while not sacrificing her toughness.

The so-called "coincidences" in the film are a plot device. This isn't a literal story of evil and its eventual downfall. This film is a metaphor for the darkness in us all.

Ultimately, what this movie is criticized for above is what makes it such a strong entry in the genre. The lack of closure and closed threads is the point of this film. We aren't supposed to be watching a movie that gets wrapped up all neatly as the "bad guy" gets his comeuppance. That's first semester screenwriting talk. This movie is meant to be a surreal plunge into the abyss of a lunatic's mind. There is rarely any closure in there~

**** out of *****

KILL BILL volume 1 and 2

On a spur of the moment decision, I decided to check these two movies out of the library and review them here, just because I can. Sir scribe-a-lot, I'm sure, will want to add his opinion at some point in the proceedings since he is a bigger Q.T. fan than I am.

Green's Sharp-edged Hattori Hanzo Sword Review:

After being gunned down and left for dead at her own wedding, spending four years in a coma and losing her unborn child in the process, The Bride aka Beatrix Kiddo aka Black Mamba (Uma Thurman) is out for revenge. Once a member of the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad, Kiddo decides to leave the squad and start a more normal life for her and her unborn child. But Bill (David Carradine), the leader of the assassins, doesn't like that. Not. One. Bit.

This is a tale of revenge, my friends. Simple and sweet revenge. One by one The Bride meets her former allies and takes them out, though not with out some challenges along the way. Volume two does have a happy ending, though. Yeah, I was surprised.

You really can't review volume one without reviewing volume two at the same time. Volume one is a great tribute to the Kung-Fu movies of the 1950's and 60's. Lots of fighting with katanas and lots of blood, guts and dismemberment, exaggerated for effect, of course. You get the basic story in volume one and more character development and more fleshing out of the story in volume two, which pays tribute in part to the Spaghetti Western. Each movie is laid out like chapters in a book, giving the story a linear type thread to follow. The music in each movie adds to the drama and excitement of the story we are being told.

Both movies are excellent in their own way. The cast is excellent and includes Thurman and Carradine, Lucy Liu, Sonnny Chiba, Gordon Liu, Michael Madsen, Darryl Hannah, Vivica A. Fox, Julie Dreyfus and others. Tarantino admits he challenged himself in directing the action in volume 1 and succeeds. It is apparent that he has a passion for the story. Neither volume is too long and each provides good pacing to the story.

I liked the "making of" documentaries on each of the Kill Bill DVDs, which gave some great and informative insight from some of the stars and from the big Q.T. himself, director Quentin Tarantino.

**** out of ***** for both films.

White Noise

Scribe's not-so-impressed Review:

Finally, somebody made a movie about Electronic Voice Phenomenon and it's really...not very interesting. In fact, if you remove Michael Keaton's intense performance, it's not really a movie, just a bunch of stuff that happens and a staticky TV set.

Proving that fringe would-be science movements make for boring film concepts, White Noise follows the tragic exploits of architect Johnathan Rivers as he mourns the death of his wife and slowly descends into an obssession with communicating with her beyond the grave. When tubby EVP expert Raymond Price arrives to reveal to Rivers that he is, like, totally the only guy in the whole world who knows how to capture the voices of dead people on tape from his TV set using only the latest software that a man with his obvious financial issues could never possibly afford, Mr. Rational Architect is all like, "Sounds good to me!" because, damn it, this is a low budget horror movie! What did you expect, a third act?

No way in hell! Or is it Purgatory. Yikes, Purgatory as a TV set stuck on a really boring channel. Nothing scarier than that. Sadly, that's true, as there is absolutely nothing scary in this sprawling mess of a slightly good idea gone horribly wrong. The pace is agonizing, the characters are inconsequential, the plot doesn't so much progress as simply jump from point to point whenever it's convenient and frankly the concept wears out its welcome in the first 30 minutes.

That leaves Michael Keaton to grimace at the camera a lot and try to figure out what the hell is happening to all the dying characters as well as the dead ones as he stupidly misinterprets his wife's warnings over and over.

Did I mention there was no third act? Well, there is an attempt at one. It occurs in the final moments of the film when a character we've never seen before whose motivations are never made clear let alone explained shows up and does crazy crap for the sake of a "thrilling" climax. The only good thing about it is that the very end of the film does not shy away from what needs to occur.

** out of ***** only because the DVD exrtras about the kooks that actually try to make sense of white noise are so much more fascinating than the film.

Green's Equally Unimpressed Review:

Architect Jonathan Rivers (Keaton) is understandably upset about the dissappearance/death of Anna (Chandra West), his incredibly sexy, world famous author/wife. About six months later, a total stranger, Raymond Price (Ian McNeice) comes out of nowhere to inform Rivers that he's received messages from Anna, who is trying to communicate with him from the "other side".

Thus, Rivers is introduced to the world of EVP, aka Electronic Voice Phenomenon - and becomes predictably addicted to it, listening for and recording messages he's received from his wife and other dead people, while watching tv monitors filled with fuzzy snow. Problem is there are some not so nice dead folks trying to communicate with the living from the other side, too. These not so nice spirits murder McNeice, cause Sarah (Deborah Kara Unger), a woman Rivers meets at McNeice's house to jump off of a balcony in a drug induced sleeping trance state and become horribly injured. Topping it all off is that Anna's messages rom the grave give warnings to her husband of bad things that are going to happen to people still living so he can try and prevent these bad things from happening.

In the end the bad spirits get to Rivers too. The last image we see is both Anna and Jonathan Rivers on the "other side" through a fuzzy, snowy television monitor.

Michael Keaton gives his usual intense performance and keeps this movie semi-credible on his own talent. I've been a fan of Unger's since "The Game" (1996). She's a talented and virtually unknown actress, whose character is out of place and frankly, unnecessary. In most cases, talent alone can't overcome weak material and a script that just doesn't know in which direction it wants to go. The characters are shallow and undeveloped. The whole concept of EVP is laughable to begin with and strictly for gullible people longing for their deceased loved ones. It stretches further the lines of believability when Anna's messages are meant to help Jonathan save lives.

This is supposed to be a horror movie. I'll admit that there were a few times I was startled but it was more of a "sudden loud noise" kind of startling rather than a "man, that was creepy" kind of startling. The only horror is that I watched this movie from beginning to end.

Please, don't waste your time with this movie, unless you're a dyed in the wool Michael Keaton fan. I'm sure you can find much better ways to spend 98 minutes of your life. Folks, I wish I had better news for ya - but I don't.

*1/2 out of *****

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