Movie ponderings

[amethyst73]

On the long leg of the flight back from Boston yesterday, I watched much of this year's version of Journey to the Center of the Earth. The aboveground part at the beginning looked dull, so I didn't bother switching my headphones from IGN's Nintendo Voice Chat podcast to the movie till the intrepid trio of Brendan Fraser, Josh Hutcherson, and Anita Briem were ready to fall down the rabbit hole. From there I found it a fairly silly film - good enough for a plane flight, I suppose, though not as good as Wall-E, which we were treated to on the way out. The sheer unlikeliness of the story, borrowed moderately directly from Verne's original novel, manages to weigh it down. Couple that with several key moments stolen pretty directly from a certain series of movies also put out by the film's home studio, New Line (a cave-in seals them into the mountain! someone hangs by his fingernails over a boiling lava pit! etc.), the inevitable theme-park rides and videogame sequences, and some situations that sound slightly plausible but probably aren't (I don't think it's likely that one would find rubies, emeralds, and diamonds all in one relatively small cave but I don't actually know), it's a movie that is best laughed at and forgotten.

One of the more unfortunate parts of the film was Fraser's character and the truly stupid comedic situations he ended up in. The one that comes to mind is moderately early on as the group is repelling down a Long Hole. Fraser's character.. I forget exactly how it happened, but he started falling or was cut loose or something and OMGHE'SGONNADIE - and he lands on the flat ground about a foot later. There are several other unfunny moments that he gamely plays out as scripted. Unfortunately, I didn't find him much more convincing when the character was supposed to be serious; they seemed overplayed in a sort of similar fashion.

Here comes the rub. I've just watched the trailer for Inkheart (coming out in January of next year) that I've vaguely heard that maybe I ought to be excited about. The concept sounds like it has promise, though I've never read the book the movie will be based on. Whose face do I find all over the trailer, in the role of the father whose voice literally brings book characters to life?

Brendan Fraser's.

Admittedly, I've never seen him in anything else, so perhaps he can do more than overplay a slightly buffoonish professor. I'd be interested in comments about Fraser, the book, early gossip on the movie, etc.

Comments

[cerebralpaladin.livejournal.com]

I, too, recently watched Journey to the Center of the Earth on a plane flight. I think I liked it more than you did-- it wasn't great art or anything, or even great fluff, but it was kinda fun, and I liked the gender roles stuff (with Hanna (?) playing the classic "male" role of the buff, outdoorsy hero who is ostensibly cold but actually caring, etc.). I also found the premise that it was self-aware-- that they knew the book, which turns out to be a real history, not fiction-- kinda interesting, although they did little with it.

But more to the point of your question-- I think Brendan Fraser is very talented. He did a great series of guest appearances on Scrubs as the brother of a recurring character. He does sometimes play "hammy" characters, but he has real acting ability. So I wouldn't use negative opinions of him from Journey to make you negative on his future projects. (I have no direct opinion on Inkheart.)

[amethyst73.livejournal.com]

To be fair, I was really tired and moderately sleep-deprived, so I was definitely in a mood to be unkind to any slightly goofy movie that might be shown. I'm glad Fraser can do more than he did in that film, though!