Up in the Air (2009)

George Clooney plays Ryan Bingham - or he's playing George Clooney. It's really hard to tell. But more about that later. Anyway, Ryan Bingham's job is to fly around the country firing people for companies that don't want to fire their own employees. Ryan enjoys the perks of his job - namely frequent flyer miles. What he doesn't enjoy is the threat brought by newcomer Natalie Keener's (also relative newcomer Anna Kendrick) ideas for change.

The layoff element of the plot is very topical, painfully so for some people. It was an interesting choice to use actual recently laid off people in the firing scenes. It was nice of the production to give these people a job for a day and it gave a real voice to the feelings of the situation. But after they say their piece, they get put by the film in the out-of-sight-out-of-mind files. And the amount of screen time they had to give so that these people could really say something made the movie drift into the borderlands of documentary. That just doesn't mesh so well with the sarcastic comedic drama stylings of writer/director Jason Reitman.

George Clooney does seem like he'd be a good Reitman fit - except instead he comes off as if he'd play his part the same way no matter who the director was. George Clooney's Ryan Bingham is also his Danny Ocean from Ocean's 11 involved in more legal but still questionable ventures, his slightly less goofy Jimmy Connelly from Leatherheads as well as a slightly toned down Harry Pfarrer from Burn After Reading. It's all charm, leadership, and conviction. He plays it well, but it's also not that far off from his public persona. So how many times can you watch it? For some the number is much lower than others.

Vera Farmiga and Anna Kendrick on the other hand pull their weight with the freshness that Clooney lacks. Farmiga is smooth as Alex Goran, an also-seasoned traveler who meets up with Bingham whenever they're in the same town. And Kendrick is eager without becoming a caricature. Although I don't recall thinking Oscar! Oscar! while watching them, I was impressed with their work and didn't mind them being nominated.

But even with the great female leads and the topicality, Up in the Air isn't very grounded. It's lacking the gravity to seem substantial enough to really care while watching it. People firing your loved ones and living fancy lives aren't so easy to connect with. It misses on the emotions that could really strike home for the masses.

Rating: 3/5
Recommended for: People who haven't been laid off and will watch George Clooney in anything.

Alice in Wonderland (2010)

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland has been directly adapted in no less than 24 movies and television shows. It's inspired premises and episodes of 13 additional TV shows and 22 more films. Tim Burton's 2010 Alice in Wonderland is listed as one of those 22 inspired pieces.

I read somewhere that Burton didn't consider his Alice a sequel to the original story. Maybe he meant the term "sequel" didn't explain it enough. Perhaps he meant it's a sequel of sorts that take elements of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass and mixes it all together into a story where most of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland took place before this one, but they're calling it by the name they use for most movies that directly adapt the first story only.

Yes, that must be it.

Alice is now 18 and finds herself at a surprise engagement party for the surprise proposal she's about to get in front of a crowd of around 100 people. Taken aback, she runs off to think about her situation and ends up falling down a hole that, you guessed it, leads to Wonderland. She's been there before but doesn't remember it and so she goes through the whole "Eat me." "Drink me." bit before we get to the newer stuff.

The Queen of Hearts (Helena Bonham Carter), who is really an amalgamation of The Queen of Hearts and the Red Queen from the original stories, has taken over Wonderland, turning it into a grisly place where everyone lives in constant fear of death and/or harm to their loved ones. The Mad Hatter (Johnny Depp) is there to guide Alice because she can save them all from this miserable existence, but only if she's the "right Alice".

And while Depp adds depth to a character that doesn't seem to have much, it should be noted that if he played any other character, that character would have been Alice's guide and he'd have been able to squeeze some sort of depth out of that character too.

The screenplay was written by Linda Woolverton, who has been marked by the media as a "girl-power specialist" due to her work on Disney's Beauty and the Beast. In an interview with The New York Times, Woolverton mentioned that she “did a lot of research on Victorian mores, on how young girls were supposed to behave, and then did exactly the opposite.” That's all fine and dandy even if it's becoming pretty commonplace - the heroine who doesn't follow all of society's rules and finds happiness.

The problem with it in this movie is that Alice is supposed to become a strong, brave, independent woman in order to save the "good guys" in Wonderland, but she's already that person from the beginning. There's not much room for her character to grow and since that's the whole point of her journey... her journey seems almost pointless. Before she gets to Wonderland we already see her eschewing proper clothing, plainly stating her beliefs, questioning others, refusing to conform, doing whatever she thinks is best in the moment, etc. I guess you could say her time in Wonderland reminded her of who she is so she could make a choice in real life that she wouldn't regret. Except that I don't get "reminder" out of this story. It's clearly supposed to be "journey".

So between that and this story being done so many times, this whole movie came off as unnecessary. And that's too bad because the acting was all done well enough, and the visuals are intriguing (even though I thoroughly dislike the concept of shooting in 2D and converting it to 3D in post).

Burton usually brings an interesting spin on things. I hope to see more of his Edward Scissorhands/Corpse Bride/Big Fish side and less of this Planet of the Apes/Alice in Wonderland. If his next project isn't something we've seen 58 other variations on, we're already stepping in the right direction.

Rating: 2/5
Recommended for:People who enjoy talking animals.

The Hurt Locker (2009)

Within the first ten minutes of The Hurt Locker you know you're watching a wonderfully crafted film. You may think from the poster and the critics' quotes that pepper the advertisements that it's going to be an ultra-violent, non-stop adventure. But it's not. The nerve-wrecking, explosive episodes are delicately balanced with moments of quiet and reflection. It's so well thought out. And with fantastic cinematography, there is so much to see.

With her trusty team of handheld cameras and a psuedo-documentary style director Kathryn Bigelow provides a realistic (although I have no idea at how accurate) look at three men's approaches to modern war. She doesn't give us action heroes. She gives us regular men who specialize in certain activities just doing their job. Each time this Explosive Ordnance Disposal team goes out to do that there's an element that makes it different from the last even though it's essentially the same job. And each time has it's own tension, despite the monotony that also exists in their task being never-ending. The main actors (Jeremy Renner, Anthony Mackie, and Brian Geraghty) flow along with this balance. Their lines are brief but they show you everything they're thinking and feeling.

The whole film is definitely show more than tell. Bigelow presents a story and in doing so raises questions and lets you take what you want from the film. The most poignant question seems to be how do men and women live in those tense conditions eventually come back to their regular lives back home? How do they reconcile those two lives?

If this doesn't at least get the Oscars for cinematography and directing, I'll be disappointed.

Rating: 5/5
Recommended for: its real feel and suspense appeal