Film

Into the mild

A Walk In the Woods

A Walk In the Woods actually spends very little time in the woods. It does, however, spend plenty of time in remote hotels, Laundromats, rental car parking lots, residential homes and diners. This film has bounced around as a project for nearly 20 years, at one point being positioned as a reunion movie for Robert Redford and Paul Newman. Now, that might’ve been by something very cool, even with a script Bob Grimm that goes for sitcom laughs and poop jokes. bgrimm@ Seeing Newman and Redford on screen again newsreview.com together would’ve earned a lot of good will from audiences, even if the characters they 1 played were a bit tacky. Instead, we get Redford following up some great performances (All is Lost, Captain America: The Winter Soldier) with perhaps his worst one, swapping bad dialogue with the perpetually croaky Nick Nolte in full clown mode. It winds up being a rough two-hour slog.

Redford plays Bill Bryson, the real life writer whose book the film is based upon. While taking a walk during somebody’s funeral, he spies the Appalachian Trail. After a few hours Googling and taking in some pictures, he decides he’s going to do the 2,000-mile hike, much to his wife’s (Emma Thompson) chagrin, who insists he gets a hiking partner.

Bryson finds a partner in Stephen Katz (Nolte), a friend he fell out with years ago who very much wants to go hiking with him for no real explainable reasons. The two eventually set out on the trail, but the chemistry between Redford and Nolte is non-existent, as if the two men have never met before. They just look and feel weird together, and while that’s something intended to be funny, it winds up being unsettling and odd.

What constitutes humor in this film? Bryson and Katz are sleeping in their tents when a couple of big bears wander into their camp. Bryson hears their approach, and the first thing he does is yell to Katz’s tent, probably not a good idea since bears have these things called ears. Then, Bryson just happens to have a bear attack handbook nearby, and he coaches Nolte to stand up in his tent and yell a lot. So the bears see a couple of tents jumping around, and decide they don’t like that sort of thing and scamper off without ripping their faces off. Hahahahaha!

First off, possible bear attacks aren’t particularly funny. They are scary. I’m all good with a scene where two guys manage to get hungry bears out of their camp, but I’m not good with a scene that feels like it should be in one of those goofy Disney Channel sitcoms. Watching Redford and Nolte behaving like asses and inserting some shots of bears roaring in disapproval is as weak as it gets. It seems the main direction given to Redford on this film was “Do your best surprised and confused look!” He spends half the film looking ridiculous on top of doing ridiculous things like falling down and getting stuck in the mud. Nolte is asked to stuff pancakes in his face and help an overweight woman who gets her panties stuck in a washing machine while doing his best Gabby Hayes impersonation. It’s downright embarrassing watching them in action. The movie is directed in a rather pedestrian way by Ken Kwapis, maker of such landmark films as

Robert Redford, pursued by bear.

1

Poor

2

Fair

3

Good

4

Very Good The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants and Dunston Checks In, so that explains a lot. Directors who were slated to helm the film in the early stages of production include Richard Linklater (Boyhood, School of Rock) and Larry Charles (Borat). I think something interesting would’ve been delivered by either one of those guys rather than something akin to a “Let’s go camping!” episode of Full House.

In the end, this movie isn’t really about hiking the Appalachian Trail. It’s more about trying to hike the Appalachian Trail and getting into wacky hijinks along the way. A better title would’ve been A Walk Into a Laundromat to Mess with Some Large Lady’s Underwear After Eating a Bunch of Pancakes While Mugging for the Camera a Whole Lot … and Then Maybe We’ll Actually Hike In the Woods for, Like, 10 Minutes. Ω

5

3American Ultra Jesse Eisenberg, having himself a great summer with his career best performance in The End of the Tour, spreads his wings as a stoner with a secret in this sporadically fun film from director Nima Nourizadeh (Project X) and writer Max Landis (Chronicle). While enjoying a fine cup of soup, convenience store clerk Mike Howell (Eisenberg) notices some dudes monkeying with his car. Seconds later, he’s killing people with a spoon. Mike’s girlfriend Phoebe (Kristen Stewart, kicking mortal ass) is concerned about her beau, who has suddenly attained the ability to wipe out people with robot precision. I will not tell you why. You have to see the movie to find out why. The film has a great premise, and could’ve been a classic dark comedy. Unfortunately, it leans a little too heavy towards the dark side in its second half and goes light on the laughs. Eisenberg and Stewart rise above any of the tonal problems and story lags to make the movie something worth seeing. Stewart just gets better with every movie she shows up in. I think her Bella-Lag is wearing off for sure. Eisenberg plays his part like an ignorant, coiled rattlesnake, and he’s actually appropriately scary at times. Again, a fun film for most of its running time, but it could’ve been something really special.

5The End of the Tour Rolling Stone writer David Lipsky’s account of his interview with David Foster Wallace, author of Infinite Jest, gets a very fine film starring Jesse Eisenberg as Lipsky and Jason Segel in a surprising, non-comedic turn as Wallace. The movie is so eloquent in the way it shows two young writers simply talking to one another about their craft, and deftly illustrates how Wallace thought and spoke thanks to an incredible performance from Segel. The film chronicles the final days of Wallace’s book tour, a time where he was trying to learn how to deal with the perils of sudden success. It’s heartbreaking in that we viewers know what fate awaits Wallace 12 years after their meeting. It touches upon the sadness and problems that plagued Wallace and eventually led him to suicide. Segel, without outright declaring what his afflictions were, gives us real insight into the insecurities and conflicts that beat Wallace down in the end. Directed by James Ponsoldt, who is on a hot streak with this and prior films The Spectacular Now and Smashed, the film offers nice insight into the sudden fame that Wallace achieved, and the journalist who was fascinated by it.

3The Gift Joel Edgerton writes, directs and stars in this capable thriller about the perils of bullying and moving back to your home state. Jason Bateman and Rebecca Hall play Simon and Robin, a married couple returning to California where Simon has a new job. While shopping for throw pillows, they run into Gordo (Edgerton), a high school pal who Simon doesn’t seem to remember at first. Gordo goes out of his way to welcome the new couple, dropping by the house uninvited, stocking their pond with fish and basically creeping out Simon. As the film progresses, more is revealed about Simon, his past with Gordo, and his current dishonesty. Bateman, who usually opts for more comedic roles, is very good as a man who thinks he has control of his domain, and thinks he can get away with habitual fibbing. Hall is terrific as the wife who can’t help but feel a little sorry for Gordo. Edgerton is creepy and somehow sympathetic as the strange man of the past who wants Simon to remember him in the worst way. Edgerton shows that he can write a screenplay with some good twists, direct it so there are plenty of surprises, and act it so that it’s good and scary.

3Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation Tom Cruise is back as Ethan Hunt. This time around, he’s hanging from airplanes, performing overly long tasks underwater, and riding a motorcycle again. Everything he does is in service of a convoluted plot involving some sort of evil syndicate of international agents. All sorts of nationalities are in on the evil, but the United Kingdom is especially nasty in this one, giving the whole thing a James Bond vibe. Simon Pegg’s role is increased this time out, his computer analyst guy becoming Hunt’s sidekick. Newcomer to the series Alec Baldwin gets a couple of good scenes as the CIA guy trying to eradicate Hunt’s agency. Rebecca Ferguson is impressive as an English agent who may or may not be a villain. Jeremy Renner is around to crack wise as he messes with Baldwin’s character, while Ving Rhames still gets to collect a paycheck. As for Emilio Estevez, sadly, he’s still dead after his elevator accident in the first film. This is my least favorite M:I yet, but it’s still a good film.

2No Escape Owen Wilson and Lake Bell act scared shitless with the best of them in No Escape, an occasionally gripping but mostly silly American tourist nightmare from director John Erick Dowdle. There are some tense moments and decent sequences in the movie, but it’s an insipid affair in the end, and all of Wilson and Bell’s bugeyed hyperventilating is for naught. Wilson plays Jack Dwyer, husband to Annie (Bell) and father of two girls, Lucy (Sterling Jerins) and Beeze (Claire Geare). After his company has failed, he takes a job overseas in an unnamed nefarious Asian country. Not long after arriving at their hotel, Jack goes out for a newspaper, only to witness a rebel uprising and the murder of an American in the street. Jack must get back to the hotel ahead of a bloodthirsty mob, corral the wife and kids, and commence running for their lives. After suddenly becoming some sort of action star able to outrun mobs and scale buildings, Jack eventually finds the family. They take to the hotel rooftop, where a bunch of tourists and hotel employees are holing up. They can’t keep the wolves at bay, and things get so bad that Jack has to throw his kids from one rooftop to the other while his wife catches them. This sequence, shot in painful slow motion, stands as the best part of the movie. Actually, it’s the only really good part of the movie. The rest of the film features an unknown enemy that epitomizes every horror film cliché pursuing helpless American victims. The screenplay tries to position the Americans as slightly villainous as well, having conspired to steal the country’s clean drinking water, or something like that. None of it really works.

4Straight Outta Compton I watched the entirety of this thrilling new N.W.A. biopic, not knowing that Ice Cube’s son was playing Ice Cube. It’s not like the guy is named Ice Cube, Jr. He’s actually named O’Shea Jackson Jr., his dad’s birth name with a Jr. tacked on to the end. Jackson, Jr. is the No. 1 reason to see Compton, a blast of a film that chronicles the rise of rap group N.W.A., the eventual infighting, and the birth of some gigantic solo careers and record labels. Along with Jackson Jr., Jason Mitchell is a revelation as Eazy-E, and Corey Hawkins provides a nice anchor as Dr. Dre. The film works best when covering the early days and the creation of the legendary album that shares the movie’s title. It also spends plenty of time on the band’s management problems with Jerry Heller (Paul Giamatti in a moderately distracting wig), and Eazy-E’s eventual death from AIDS. At a running time of 180 minutes, plenty of ground gets covered, and covered in a way that never gets boring. This is a solid cinematic time capsule that gives some deserved glory to an influential group that forever changed the landscape of hip-hop and brought much needed attention to a very troubled part of the world. It does the band, and the biopic genre in general, proud.

3Trainwreck The hilarious Amy Schumer gets her first starring vehicle with a screenplay she wrote under the directorial tutelage of Judd Apatow and costarring Bill Hader. I would say this movie signals the arrival of Schumer as a cinematic force to be reckoned with. She plays Amy, a magazine writer playing the field in New York and doing it rather sloppily. When she’s assigned a story covering a sports medicine doctor (Hader), she unexpectedly falls for the guy, which puts into flux her whole plan to just fool around with a lot of people. Schumer has crafted a pretty run-of-the-mill romantic comedy plotline with her screenplay, peppered with sometimes beautifully shocking profanity. She shows that she has the ability to nail the laughs, but she can also bring the emotional stuff, too. She has a funeral scene that is, dare I say, sublime. Hader is his always-terrific self as the shell-shocked boyfriend just trying to bring some stability into Amy’s life, and Colin Quinn is terrific as her retirement home-dwelling father. The story is a little weak and predictable, but Schumer and Hader are awesome together, so that makes this very much worthwhile.