I Approve of This Movie: Phantoms

Stereotypical 90's thriller poster for the win!

The Short Version:

Dean Koontz's Phantoms manages to overcome most of its B-movie trappings to earn the distinction of being the best feature-length X-Files episode never made.

The Long Version:

I love to read Uncle John’s Bathroom Readers. I love to read in the bathroom period, so to have books that are tailor-made for the job is a real treat of Western society. The reason I bring this up is because the books often feature obscure movie gems and other things left in what they delightfully term the “Dustbin of History”. I think if we were to go sifting through that place more often, we’d find a whole bunch of things we wished we had but thought didn’t exist.

Dean Koontz’s Phantoms has most definitely taken up residence in the dustbin of movie history. Or as they call it these days, Netflix.

In case you missed it, this 1998 thriller had most of the requisite elements to become a modest hit at the time:

• Based on a best-selling novel

• Simple, easy-to-remember title

• Full usage of the “Stephen King’s” principle of name recognition

• Cast of hot, young 20-somethings

• Peter Freaking O’Toole

Omar Sharif wishes he was that cool.

Yes, that last one was not a mistake. Lawrence of Arabia himself – the man so awesome he turned down a knighthood – was in a low-rent 90's thriller with a bunch of Teen Choice Award hopefuls. What was he doing in it? Some might call it ‘slumming it,’ or ‘paying the rent.’ I prefer to think of it as ‘adding a touch of class to an otherwise lesser film.’ I will give the producers credit: if you’re going to have a character whose job is mostly to lend the proceedings credibility by espousing much exposition, you could do worse than hire Peter O’Toole to do it. I for one could listen to that man read the phonebook. Or lyrics to horrible songs:

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Since I know of precisely two other people who have seen this movie – in theatres no less! – I can safely assume you, dear reader, are in the dark as to what I’m going on about. Phantoms is a movie that is chalk full of scary movie clichés:

1. Two sisters return to their sleepy Colorado town to find that nearly every single person in town has vanished very suddenly. 2. Things get spooky quickly and soon they run into the hunky still-alive Sheriff, his screw-loose deputy and another soon-to-be-dead deputy. 3. Tension builds as they attempt to find a) anyone who’s alive, b) a car that works, and c) a way to contact the outside world to call in the big guns. 4. The latter finally happens, you think the pros will get to the bottom of things, it all goes horribly wrong, the evil something-or-other reveals itself and its intensions which requires the help of... 5. the one man in the world who is wise to this terror that’s been lurking in the depths, Peter O’Toole. Or, you know, his character.

It all sounds pretty horrible. And by all rights, it probably should have been. But for some uncanny reason there is enough meat on this bone and enough special sauce that it’s been drenched in to set it apart from the million other dishes that are just like it.

Let's have a look-see here, shall we?

It starts by bringing in one of the classiest thespians ever to grace the screen. But it goes beyond that. For starters, Peter O’Toole’s character doesn’t show up until roughly the half-way mark. So for the movie to not have been unbearable up to that point must mean they did some other things right.

What things you may ask? Well, I wouldn’t say the rest of the cast was stellar, but it was certainly competant. Phantoms big pull for the younger audience was the newly-minted leading man, Ben Affleck. To look back at Affleck’s early career trajectory now is something of a head-scratcher. Here was a man who had just won an Oscar(!) for co-writing the Good Will Hunting screenplay. Yet his next movie after Phantoms would be Armageddon, a film which time has not been kind to. His J-Lo/Gigli debacle was a few years away but I think we can all agree it took ‘Fleck a few years to find his footing. He has never really had the sheer acting chops that his mate Matt Damon does, and that shows in Phantoms. Yet for all his inexperience at this point in his career, he does a decent job of leading the show, even if he looks hilariously too young to be the town Sheriff, fiction or not.

Sheriff Babyface

The other hot commodity that this movie cashed in on was Rose McGowan. Well, when I say hot commodity I mean she was a recognizable name that had been in a few decent hits up to that point. Frankly, I’ve never been the biggest fan of her acting, but I’ll give her points (and the writers) for not making her character gratingly annoying, since she was the most obvious candidate for the classic “stupid hysterical person”.

The real diamond in the rough that Phantoms managed to pull from its bag of tricks was in casting Liev Schreiber. I took notice of this actor from an early age and have been a big fan ever since. Even in spectacularly bad films he still manages to come out cleanly. Which is not all that surprising for an actor who can convincingly play Orson Welles in all his narcissistic glory. Liev is the real surprise treat of the film and manages to unnerve you more than any spooky special effect.

Zero context, still creepy. That's talent, people.

On that note, I do want to give credit to the creators of the film for not grasping at CGI straws they couldn’t afford. While this movie came out at the beginning of what I call the Second Age of CGI – The Matrix was only a year away – the filmmakers used it very sparingly. Which is good, because on a small budget film like this bad CGI is the first thing to show the cracks in the illusion, and often has the effect of making you laugh instead of jump. This film is yet another example of how effective practical special effects can be at creating tension or fright when used simply and properly.

Hello? Any creepy monsters out there? No? Ok, good.

In fact, Phantoms seems to borrow heavily from the Jaws principle of: Less Monster is More. Through virtually the whole film you never see the whole thing – until the very end which almost invalidates my previous point on CGI, but I digress – and the film is much stronger for the restraint. Part of this wisdom can be laid at the feet of Dean Koontz himself, who also wrote the screenplay. This actually brings up a point I think more films could learn from: let the original authors at least have a go at writing the screenplay for their own material. No one knows these worlds like the people who create them, and it also deflates the common fanboy complaint that someone butchered the novel in translation because they didn't get it.

The other person that deserves a lot of credit for this movie being more creepy than craptacular is director Joe Chappelle. His filmography is almost non-existent, but he’s a veteran TV director from such shows as The Wire and, more importantly, Fringe. The Fringe connection is very important, so I hope you’ll indulge me as I go full nerd on you for a minute:

WARNING: FULL NERD ALERT

1. Chappelle not only directed a number of Fringe episodes, he also served as Executive Producer on the series. 2. Fringe was in many ways indirectly (and even in a few winking references directly) the successor to The X-Files. 3. The X-Files was one of the greatest spooky, sci-fi, thriller TV shows ever made and frequently had storylines and monsters that fit Phantoms’ description to a tee. This is why I call Phantoms the greatest feature-length episode of The X-Files never made.

The X-Files: sentient black oil that takes possession of its host.
Phantoms: sentient black goo that absorbs, then mimics its host.

Honestly, if you go into this movie with that mentality you’ll enjoy it much more than you might if you were expecting Invasion of the Body Snatchers-level of fright. Heck, at 96 minutes, the movie is short enough to be considered a TV series two-parter. The look is decent but the camera work, the angles, the feel of the movie is that of a really good episode from a series like The Outer Limits or The X-Files instead of a shiny blockbuster.

Hey fellas! What's up?

And Peter O’Toole’s appearance? It’s like a celebrity guest star during sweeps week. What’s funny is that, while this may have just been a job to pay the bills for him, it actually looks like he’s having fun. Clearly he knows this is not Shakespeare, but he gives it a go and makes the movie better because of it.

As for the film’s monster I would imagine that this creation of Koontz’s is primarily why the movie got made in the first place. While giant, sentient, malevolent… somethings lying in wait underground are not new to movies (or other media for that matter) this film takes a bit of a deviation by having this particular sentient goo become convinced that it is in fact, The Devil. That little twist makes the beast that much more terrifying because if you believe you are incarnate evil, you’re liable to do some pretty horrible things based on that assumption.

That being said, this isn’t a movie that revels in buckets of blood and stomach-churning levels of gore. In fact, overall it’s fairly tame in what you actually see on screen, which again shows a certain wisdom on the filmmakers part. As we all know, there's no horror like implied horror.

I wish more scary movies would get that idea through their thick skulls. 

Feel that implied horror. Feel it!

This movie is currently available on Netflix Canada

Be forewarned, it's in... Full Screen!! 

My Name is Rick Ames

and I Approve of This Movie

I Approve of This Movie: Les Misérables

Happiness awaits.

Editor's Note: This is a guest review by Kelly Ames.

The Short Version:
Hooper’s film is a pleasing adaptation of the widely loved staged musical. However, an already strong film could have been made stronger by making different casting choices.

The Long Version:

My first encounter with the musical Les Misérables happened when I had just turned 13 while in London, England. A girls choir I was a part of decided to bring us to London for a week to see the sights and sing in Westminster Abbey. It was pretty unreal. Especially seeing that I was twelve years old and had to celebrate my first birthday as a teen away from my loving family. All that was made more bearable by good friends, toilet paper streamers, and the West End. Oh yes… my love of musicals took flight on this excursion.

Marketing team, you've earned a slow clap.

Don’t get me wrong. We were in the nosebleeds of nosebleed sections and needed to pay ten pence to use the attached opera glasses to actually see what was happening on stage. But, you know what? It didn’t matter. Boublil and Schönberg had written such an incredibly captivating musical based on the Victor Hugo book that even a just-turned 13 year-old adored it and could understand this story from miles away (or at least it felt like it). The music catches me every time. I immediately bought the soundtrack tape (cassettes. remember those?) and repeatedly, REPEATEDLY borrowed the “Les Misérables” reference book and libretto from the public library. I belted the entirety of the soundtrack from memory and even tried singing ALL the parts in “One Day More”. (Yah, that’s not even possible.)

Now that you know that, you can understand that I was ecstatic to hear a movie version was being filmed with no less than Hugh Jackman. Though, I did get a little concerned when I heard some of the casting choices...

Uh... why?

Fast-forward to now, and two good girlfriends/fellow Mommies and I are sitting in the theatre waiting for the show to start. I know Rick has already mentioned this, but since the arrival of our darling Izzy, we’ve needed to be more selective with our movie choices (HOLY COW, the amount of money we spent on entertainment and eating out before she arrived). When it’s a movie your significant other doesn’t really have an interest in seeing… good luck. So, I was super excited to be able to see this on the big screen before it left theatres.

Thank you, Oscars!

My thoughts? Simply put, Wow. Hooper did such an admirable job of trying to stay true to the musical, as well as the book, and even added his own flair. The cinematography marveled me on more the one occasion, though there may have been one or two too many of the sweeping vertical crane shots. Still, holy crap. I loved it. I cried continuously in the theatre (that’s a good thing) even though I knew every single thing that was going to happen. *sigh. Before I go on, I really have to mention the set decoration. In the first 15 minutes of the film, want to know what your first thought is besides, ‘Hugh Jackman, I adore you’? That thought would be: ‘Hmm, glad I didn’t have to live there’. Dreary, disease, violence, abuse of power, and rain.  Always, ALWAYS raining!

Someone get Eponine an umbrella!

But, I’m an actor and that tends to be what I focus on. How were the performances of Les Mis? Concisely, I could tell you it was a mixed bag from ‘absolutely incredible’ to ‘why did they cast you again?’ Obviously, I’ve made clear my love for Jackman. I had the immense pleasure of seeing him perform in his one-man show in Toronto (thanks Hubs!) and could not get over how excellent of an entertainer he was. Hearing that he was cast as Jean Valjean set my heart a-flutter and I knew this film was in good hands. Jackman really captured the essence of the character. He also really embraced the new form of recording, where the cast had earpieces with live piano accompaniment streaming in so that the performers could literally do whatever they wanted to with the music. That meant musical decisions were being made based on the character’s emotions and thought structure, not on what sounded best with the orchestra. Seriously, watch this featurette:

Notable performances would be Samantha Barks as Eponine, Helena Bonham Carter and Sacha Baron Cohen as the Thénadiers, and a surprisingly compelling Anne Hathaway as Fantine. I didn’t know what to expect with Hathaway playing this tragic character due to the fact that I had heard her sing and it wasn’t mind-blowingly good. What I discovered was she devoted her entire soul to playing Fantine and that, though it may not always have been a vocally-pleasing sound, my gosh, did she nail it.

However, those thoughts do not extend to the entirety of the cast. Russell Crowe as Javert really left me wishing he gave more. Javert needs to be played with ferocity, strength and viciousness that I really felt Crowe didn’t even bother trying to attempt. I dug his choice of being a “good” and devoted man, but you need more. One example is the scene between Valjean and Javert in the hospital room after Fantine dies. In the original cast recording you can hear the strength needed for both characters. Particularly, when both parallel lines join on the word “Javert!”. They didn’t even TRY in the movie version which kind of left me with soul crushing disappointment. It’s called “The Confrontation,” for crying out loud. 

Handy 'Confrontation' Comparison

1. How the movie did it:

2. The correct way to do it:

I’m not saying Crowe did a poor job of acting. I’m just saying that his voice was not able to match his acting choices. I had similar feelings for Amanda Seyfried as Cosette, as well. Good actor, but had a voice that distracted me from her performance.

As to being true to the stage musical, I truly do feel Hooper tried his best (considering some of the limitations of the actors chosen). I know that there has been some flack from fans regarding the additional songs and scenes, however I can appreciate how the additions work cinematically. Particularly, when Hooper answered the question of how the heck Valjean and Cosette get to Paris.  Another addition I adore is the Valjean song “Suddenly”. Call me a sentimental fool, but I got weepy and remembered my own experiences holding my own precious daughter for the first time and marveling at how much I loved someone so deeply after just meeting them. I leave you with that and hope you enjoyed my little guest review.  Sorry to my editior (aka Rick) for my long-windedness. :P

(Ed: Ha! You call that long-winded?)

SIGH.

My Name is Kelly Ames

and I Approve of This Movie

I Approve of This Game: Kentucky Route Zero

Well, what do we got here?

[UPDATE: This review mentions several times that you can buy the first act of this game for $7. Cardboard (the devs) have since decided to sell them all only as a bundle for simplicity.]

The Short Version:
Less of a game and more of a quirky piece of interactive fiction. You can't die. You can only experience. And for $7 I'd say it's well worth it. Try if you like Myst or The Walking Dead: The Game.

The Long Version:
I've been meaning to branch out from movie reviews for about a week now, if only to establish that this blog can and will cover other mediums. I just haven't known what to branch out to – lots of ideas, nothing firm.

So, to that end, I'm starting by telling you about a delightful point & click adventure called Kentucky Route Zero. It's a game that's about as odd as it sounds. You play as Conway, a delivery truck driver for an antiques shop looking to make a delivery (don't know what or to whom), and in order to do so you need to find the titular Route Zero – a highway which may or may not exist. Not exactly your normal fare for a video game, which is what I found so appealing about it.

The developers – of which there are a grand total of two – have dubbed the experience a "magical realist adventure." Since that didn't mean a whole lot to me I turned to our trusty friend Wikipedia and discovered that Magical Realism is:

"a genre where magic elements are a natural part in an otherwise mundane, realistic environment."

Sounds reasonable enough. Furthermore, it turns out that the pioneer of this genre was none other than Franz Kafka. Now for those of you who don't know, Kafka was a German writer from the early 20th century whose works inspired a whole genre unto itself ("Kafkaesque"), one of the most famous examples of which being Terry Gilliam's Brazil – one of my very favourite films. That's a review for another day but needless to say, I quickly found myself in strangely familiar surroundings – like Luke on Dagobah – in this case, the quiet, leisurely, and somewhat spooky hills of Kentucky.

Next stop, Bizarro World!

Now, unless you've at least driven through Kentucky like I have, it's not something that's easy to convey in words, but without question there is a weird vibe you get in that part of America. It's a similar feeling I get when you go through West Virginia: the land seems very old, very beautiful, and hiding a bunch of secrets. Not necessarily dark ones, but spooky ones all the same. If it sounds like I'm embellishing reality to make for more intriguing writing, I apologize. But I honestly have always felt some... peculiar feelings in that part of the country. Again, nothing sinister. It's too simple, too folksy, and frankly, too religious an area to be terrified of devils hiding in the mountainsides. But I do feel that it's the sort of place where the phrase "there's something in them hills" comes from.

What allows Kentucky Route Zero to establish this familiar-yet-surreal vibe so quickly and thoroughly are three elements that set this game apart from so many other adventure games: the visuals, the music and the writing. First, I'd like to wax on a bit about the visual style.

Lights are on but nobody's home.

The art style is something very unique. In fact, it's the one thing that first caught my attention and drew me to the game. It is not a retro 8- or 16-bit, early Nintendo look as so many smaller-budget games are these days. It's also not another retro-futuristic pixel art endeavour. I like those styles as much as the next person, but they are getting a tad overused. Instead, Kentucky Route Zero opts for an absolute minimalist vector art style. Everything in the game world is constructed of basic shapes and hard lines, without any aliasing – everything looks sharp, defined, even jagged. It's a bold style to do, but the results (as you can see) are striking. It also comes with an unseen side bonus: because it's such a basic visual style, it's very simple for the computer to process, so the game runs on even the most modest PCs. Before I move on I will note that, while the style is very different from most games today, it does have roots in the past. Specifically, the creators themselves have acknowledged taking inspiration from one of my absolute all-time favourite PC games: Another World (Out of This World in North America). 

22 years old. Still awesome.

The second part of the game's trinity of great design is the audio. I said above it was "music" but that might not be the most accurate way of putting it. Certainly, there is music in this game and it's a wonderful blend of quiet electronica, folk, bluegrass and gospel. That's quite the mix. But in addition to the soundtrack that simultaneously heightens the surreal and echoes of Kentucky's past, there is a lot of very simple but very effective sound design. Like the visuals, everything about the sound design is minimalist, but it's impressive that when you're simply staring at a road map of Kentucky to navigate around, with very little in the way of visual cues to tell you what you're looking at, you still get that creeping feeling of being alone on a deserted highway at night.

Seriously, it's more effective than it looks like.

The one bit of audio you might expect to find in an adventure game however, (namely voice overs) is noticeably absent. Which brings me to the final piece of the puzzle that makes this game work so well: writing. This game is all presented through on-screen text. Don't let that scare you off, because really it reveals the true nature of this game (or as I've called it previously, an 'experience'). This game is more like reading a great book. The characters are all eccentric and offer you just enough of their backstory to pull you in, but hold enough back to know that there is a lot more going on with all of them than it seems. In fact it's the writing that becomes the most unusual, and ultimately rewarding piece of gameplay, because you're sort of the story's narrator. I don't want to give away too much, but basically your primary action in the game is choosing different pieces of dialogue. Not just for Conway, our hero, but even for other characters at times. The responses are also more intriguing than the standard yes/no, act the hero/play the villain types of responses. The words you choose begin to build out the backstory for the characters and, in a way, create your own version of the game's story. It also helps that the writing is filled with off-beat, witty remarks and statements. This is not a game that takes itself too seriously – a trap it could have easily fallen into. 

Choose Your Own Adventure: Surreal Edition

There are a few other things you should know before you embark on your journey to find the fabled Route Zero. First, as I said above, you can't die in this game. You can't get stuck. You can't lose. It's a great kind of game for people who don't normally like them. If you're a fan of adventure games, like Myst or The Walking Dead, this game differs in that there are no real puzzles to solve. Nothing impedes your progress except time. And time is something that this game takes its sweet share of. This is a leisurely-paced experience on purpose. I would not say that it's slow, but rather gives you time to drink in your surroundings and lose yourself in the world. While you can't die in the game, there are several unsual, spooky moments that keep up a bit of tension and have you looking at every detail on screen to see if you just saw something or if your eyes were playing tricks. It's not a scary game, not even slightly. Just... eerie, combined with a detached sense of humour. It's like a great ghost story that you could still tell to children and not pay for years of therapy. 

Why are we walking towards the creepy house on the hill?

That being said, those children would likely not have the slightest clue of what's going on anyway. This is not a game where you walk away with everything having made sense. It's a surreal game on purpose. It's also only the first of five acts, which are planned to be released over the course of the year, so the story is for now incomplete. The episodic format is a compelling new development in gaming, pulling you in and making you want more, much like a TV drama does. The game as it stands is quite short – around two hours – but that's not bad for $7.

If I can stand on my soapbox for a moment, these are the type of experiments that I like to support. This was developed initially after a successful Kickstarter campaign, created by two guys in their basement with a unique vision. It's a game unlike most you find out there these days and, by golly, we need fresher ideas than just another first-person shooter set in... who cares where. Lastly, I always feel a little warm and fuzzy inside knowing that I've helped support someone in their dream, as I hope people will support me in mine someday. Like I said, it was only 7 bucks. I've paid more to see two-hour movies that I hated.

I'll leave you now with a one-line pitch, given by the creators. I think it captures the spirit of the game nicely.

"Kentucky Route Zero is not a real highway, so the only way to travel it is to play this game."

This game is available for direct download here.
You can play it on PC, Mac and Linux.
System requirements are almost nonexistent.

My Name is Rick Ames
and I Approve of This Game.