Friday, December 31, 2004
The Lemony Snicket movie finally came out, so I suppose I should close the loop. You may remember (if you read the archives back to June), that I started reading the dreary books upon seeing early movie marketing, my attempt to anticipate the next Harry Potter phenomenon. The movie is finishing its second week in the theaters and is still showing on at least two screens in the multiplexes, so I guess it's not doing to badly, although the drop off in revenue from the first week indicates there was a lot of pent-up demand but not a lot of word of mouth. I've seen less advertising than I expected, and you know the best way to get kids into your movie is advertising. Heaven knows quality has little to do with it.
Perhaps Snicket fell victim to the disappointing showing of "The Polar Express", which was far from a runaway success. Perhaps the advertising execs decided to cut back a little.
Here's some advice for the next Hollywood executive that thinks a ten page picture book can be expanded to an hour and a half: there is a lot of demand for Christmas specials. Next time, keep it to a half hour, the size it should have been anyway, and you're guaranteed twenty years of residuals, if it's good.
In contrast with "The Polar Express", "Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events" compresses three books, each about 150 pages, into one movie. I could start my criticism there, but first, let's load up on positive points.
First, this may be the role Jim Carey was born to play (actually, arguably that would be his role in "The Mask", but a guy's got to do something while he waits to die). He gets to chew the scenery, a ham actor playing a ham actor. If you see the movie, you'll notice in the scene where his character, Count Olaf, is established, before we even see Count Olaf, we see his home, which is dirty, spacious yet rundown, and decorated with paintings of Jim Carey as Count Olaf. Even in the paintings, Jim Carey overacts.
I have to say, Jim Carey is relishing the role, but I don't think he quite captures the menace of Count Olaf. He is not sedate enough to be menacing, and reduces Count Olaf almost to the level of the other adult characters, who are empty-headed monomaniacs in general.
Meryl Streep, who plays Aunt Josephine, could have been some help to Jim Carey on developing a character without overplaying the ticks. Billy Connelly plays Uncle Montgomery Montgomery absolutely straight, perhaps the best acting decision of all the supporting characters. Uncle Monty might have a day job teaching obnoxious precocious teens in a New York magnate school. In a bit part as a theater critic, Dustin Hoffman is just slumming. He doesn't have anything to work with, and there are less costly actors that could have served better, for starters because my little brain wouldn't say "Aha, Dustin Hoffman, slumming it." Cedric the Entertainer made an amusing cop, but could not suppress his sitcom tendencies, which is to say, he delivered his lines ably but did not have an actual character other than himself. It's Cedric in a cop's uniform.
The sets were marvelous. I'm not a person you should get decorating opinions from, but the locations, while having the definite feeling of existing on a sound stage (in contrast with the first two Harry Potter films, which had gobs of outdoors location shots), they were imaginatively designed and shot and I think true to the book (of course, I'm not a person from whom you should get opinions on the faithfulness to Lemony Snicket books either). They were drab and dreary, but not dark like some similar films, where it seems the darkness helps keep the budget down by saving the set dressers the trouble of putting together a complete set. The little details are attended to.
One of the problems with the books (or maybe it's one of their charms) is that you can't nail down a period in which they exist. Many details, starting with the Snicket's typewriter, seem to put them in the forties, give or take a decade, but periodically, modernity intrudes. The movies are set in a parallel universe, where forties-era cars have reel-to-reel tape players set in the dash. The home of Aunt Josephine has appliances from the forties, the train and convenience store are appropriate to the era. For that matter, so is the sea-side town near Aunt Josephine's home, but I've been to New England, and there is no shortage of towns in Maine and New Hapshire that could have stood in with no re-working. Some places, time just stands still.
The story moves quickly, perhaps too quickly. The kids are removed from Count Olaf's home seemingly days after arriving. All we can say is at least they won't have to do any more dishes. Before the audience even trusts Uncle Monty, he is dead, and I can't say I much cared. The movie is half done and that's two books down. To be fair, after devouring the third book in an almost as perfunctory manner, we cycle back to what I can only assume is the conclusion to the first book (which I haven't read).
I'm almost done now. If I only have one post in a month, I'm going to milk it.
The lead child actors, Emily Browning and Liam Aiken, are very able. The leads, perhaps through luck and perhaps through make-up, genuinely look like siblings, with similar hair, height, and complexions. They both have tight mannerisms of indoor children. My sister tells me that comes naturally to Liam. Honestly, the children don't have enough to do, in the sense of showing or developing character. The story follows them around, but their moods are limited. The actors playing cowboys in old westerns got to exercise more range than these teens do, and that's too bad. The teen actors seem to have good resumes, and I can only assume that this was their one shot at Lemony Snicket, given that in the books the children do not age (actually, they do have birthdays, but it would appear they compress a lot of living, and parallel storylines, into each year).
Amusingly to me, the movie I think subverts Lemony Snicket, with an uplifting if not exactly happy ending. That doesn't mean you shouldn't worry about your sensitive child, if you have one, or for that matter for your paranoid child. The first will still be crushed at the end, and the second will have all his suspicions confirmed.
Summary time: Thumbs up or thumbs down? I can't say. If this were up against the first two Harry Potter movies, I know I'd prefer a little happy-go-lucky adventuring, where a vanquished foe gets his comeuppance in the end (i.e. Harry Potter wins). On the other hand, given the option between three plucky children in a never-ending bad circumstance and a movie about and all-powerful, self-centered, moody teen, I'd rather watch the eminently likeable Violet and Klaus any day.
Perhaps Snicket fell victim to the disappointing showing of "The Polar Express", which was far from a runaway success. Perhaps the advertising execs decided to cut back a little.
Here's some advice for the next Hollywood executive that thinks a ten page picture book can be expanded to an hour and a half: there is a lot of demand for Christmas specials. Next time, keep it to a half hour, the size it should have been anyway, and you're guaranteed twenty years of residuals, if it's good.
In contrast with "The Polar Express", "Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events" compresses three books, each about 150 pages, into one movie. I could start my criticism there, but first, let's load up on positive points.
First, this may be the role Jim Carey was born to play (actually, arguably that would be his role in "The Mask", but a guy's got to do something while he waits to die). He gets to chew the scenery, a ham actor playing a ham actor. If you see the movie, you'll notice in the scene where his character, Count Olaf, is established, before we even see Count Olaf, we see his home, which is dirty, spacious yet rundown, and decorated with paintings of Jim Carey as Count Olaf. Even in the paintings, Jim Carey overacts.
I have to say, Jim Carey is relishing the role, but I don't think he quite captures the menace of Count Olaf. He is not sedate enough to be menacing, and reduces Count Olaf almost to the level of the other adult characters, who are empty-headed monomaniacs in general.
Meryl Streep, who plays Aunt Josephine, could have been some help to Jim Carey on developing a character without overplaying the ticks. Billy Connelly plays Uncle Montgomery Montgomery absolutely straight, perhaps the best acting decision of all the supporting characters. Uncle Monty might have a day job teaching obnoxious precocious teens in a New York magnate school. In a bit part as a theater critic, Dustin Hoffman is just slumming. He doesn't have anything to work with, and there are less costly actors that could have served better, for starters because my little brain wouldn't say "Aha, Dustin Hoffman, slumming it." Cedric the Entertainer made an amusing cop, but could not suppress his sitcom tendencies, which is to say, he delivered his lines ably but did not have an actual character other than himself. It's Cedric in a cop's uniform.
The sets were marvelous. I'm not a person you should get decorating opinions from, but the locations, while having the definite feeling of existing on a sound stage (in contrast with the first two Harry Potter films, which had gobs of outdoors location shots), they were imaginatively designed and shot and I think true to the book (of course, I'm not a person from whom you should get opinions on the faithfulness to Lemony Snicket books either). They were drab and dreary, but not dark like some similar films, where it seems the darkness helps keep the budget down by saving the set dressers the trouble of putting together a complete set. The little details are attended to.
One of the problems with the books (or maybe it's one of their charms) is that you can't nail down a period in which they exist. Many details, starting with the Snicket's typewriter, seem to put them in the forties, give or take a decade, but periodically, modernity intrudes. The movies are set in a parallel universe, where forties-era cars have reel-to-reel tape players set in the dash. The home of Aunt Josephine has appliances from the forties, the train and convenience store are appropriate to the era. For that matter, so is the sea-side town near Aunt Josephine's home, but I've been to New England, and there is no shortage of towns in Maine and New Hapshire that could have stood in with no re-working. Some places, time just stands still.
The story moves quickly, perhaps too quickly. The kids are removed from Count Olaf's home seemingly days after arriving. All we can say is at least they won't have to do any more dishes. Before the audience even trusts Uncle Monty, he is dead, and I can't say I much cared. The movie is half done and that's two books down. To be fair, after devouring the third book in an almost as perfunctory manner, we cycle back to what I can only assume is the conclusion to the first book (which I haven't read).
I'm almost done now. If I only have one post in a month, I'm going to milk it.
The lead child actors, Emily Browning and Liam Aiken, are very able. The leads, perhaps through luck and perhaps through make-up, genuinely look like siblings, with similar hair, height, and complexions. They both have tight mannerisms of indoor children. My sister tells me that comes naturally to Liam. Honestly, the children don't have enough to do, in the sense of showing or developing character. The story follows them around, but their moods are limited. The actors playing cowboys in old westerns got to exercise more range than these teens do, and that's too bad. The teen actors seem to have good resumes, and I can only assume that this was their one shot at Lemony Snicket, given that in the books the children do not age (actually, they do have birthdays, but it would appear they compress a lot of living, and parallel storylines, into each year).
Amusingly to me, the movie I think subverts Lemony Snicket, with an uplifting if not exactly happy ending. That doesn't mean you shouldn't worry about your sensitive child, if you have one, or for that matter for your paranoid child. The first will still be crushed at the end, and the second will have all his suspicions confirmed.
Summary time: Thumbs up or thumbs down? I can't say. If this were up against the first two Harry Potter movies, I know I'd prefer a little happy-go-lucky adventuring, where a vanquished foe gets his comeuppance in the end (i.e. Harry Potter wins). On the other hand, given the option between three plucky children in a never-ending bad circumstance and a movie about and all-powerful, self-centered, moody teen, I'd rather watch the eminently likeable Violet and Klaus any day.
