Creed

Released:  November 25^th, 2015

Rated:  PG-13

Distributor:  Warner Bros.

Starring:  Michael B. Jordan, Sylvester Stallone, Tessa Thompson, Phylicia Rashad

Directed by:  Ryan Coogler

Written by:  Ryan Coogler, Aaron Covington

Personal Bias Alert:  never seen a Rocky film

7.8 of 10

            It seems that in 2015, the 7^th time’s the charm.  Furious 7 racked up money and praise back in April, and Creed appears to be going in the same direction.  Oddly, both films find their series at tricky crossroads, unable to continue as they had before.  The Fast and Furious series lost one of its stars.  Creed must admit that Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) can no longer box.  The magnitude of these changes cannot be understated, and if nothing else, both series have seized the moment and delivered a crowd-pleasing entry for their die-hard fans.

            In Creed, the baton is passed from Rocky to Creed’s illegitimate son, Adonis (Michael B. Jordan).  Adonis is trying to prove himself without using his father’s reputation, making his way under the surname Johnson.  Of course, the illegitimate tag gnaws at him, and he’s angered at the thought of taking the name of a man he never met.  This doesn’t stop him from taking advantage of the connection to get Rocky in his corner, though (a contradiction that is thankful acknowledged), and the two form a relationship far beyond that of coach and trainee.

            The formula for the Rocky movies have always been well-worn, and Creed does nothing to change that.  We know all along that Rocky and Adonis will form a close relationship, that complications will arise, and then a big fight will bring them back together.  Like all great sports movies, the winning and losing isn’t what it’s all about.  The fight is symbolic, and unfortunately for Creed, that symbol is its weakest link.  The film’s metaphor is too simple and too clean to knock you out, a misstep that is a holdover from writer/director Ryan Coogler’s previous film, Fruitvale Station.  Neither film is sunk by this simplicity, but it’s more apparent in this drug out behemoth.  There’s just too much tire-spinning, too many moments of macho men acting out, and yes, too many training montages.  If these moments had built on each other to complicate the core relationship then we’d be having an entirely different conversation, but the film uses them only to pound down the same points, leaving the middle section feeling a bit weary.

            Still, complicated is not a defining word of the Rocky series, and fans that are turning up for a good-ole underdog story won’t be disappointed.  Jordan turns in an effervescent performance as Adonis, showing that he’s more than capable of carrying the sweat and the charm of the series.  Stallone is as comfortable as he’ll ever be in a role, and even if he’s not your cup of tea (he’s certainly not mine), it’s hard to argue against such a solid performance.  You’re third lead here would have to be Tessa Thompson, another charismatic actor that, like Jordan, has unfortunately been held back by the color of her skin.  Both should be much bigger stars than they are, and perhaps the best thing about Creed is that the continued series should become a career stabilizer for both of them.  Thompson plays Adonis’s love interest, a role that starts out as touchingly well-rounded but unfortunately fades.  And yet, Thompson and Jordan give such excellent performances that their relationship always works, and it will be a pleasure to see where they, along with Sly’s Rocky, end up next.

            What separates Creed from the sports movie pack is just how well it’s made, partially thanks to the performances that have already been outlined and partially because of Coogler’s direction.  His faults as a writer aside, Coogler is an unusually assured young filmmaker, taking chances here that mostly pay off in a beautiful and moving film.  The camera swirls, ducks, and pounds with the fighters, and the score goes big and sweeping.  In spite of the film’s simplicity, Coogler will play your emotions like a fiddle, and that last fight will certainly leave you feeling something, even if it does fall short of the genre’s legends.

            Coogler has made Creed into a reboot worthy of continued entries.  There are aspects of these characters that would be interesting to explore, and Jordan and Thompson prove to be a duo that will be exciting to watch well into the future.  It’s a rousing success for a very simple franchise and a tantalizing taste of what it’s capable of becoming.

Other Notes:

Ø  Obviously, Rocky is not a series that speaks to me.  That I responded to this film as much as I did is pretty remarkable.

Ø  This gets my nomination for Funniest Performance by a Turtle.

Ø  I do sincerely applaud this series for willingly shifting its focus to non-white people.  I have full confidence that audiences will continue to shell out money no matter the color of the actors onscreen.

Furious 7

Released:  April 3^rd, 2015

Rated:  PG-13

Distributor:  Universal Pictures

Starring:  Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Dwayne Johnson, Michelle Rodriguez, Jordana Brewster, Tyrese Gibson, Chris “Ludacris” Bridges, Kurt Russell, Jason Statham

Directed by:  James Wan

Written by:  Chris Morgan

Personal Bias Alert:  never seen any Fast & Furious movies, intrigued by James Wan directing

3 of 10

            Nothing in Furious 7 is subtle; the cars are fast, the butts are in your face, and the ‘character beats’ hit you like a sledgehammer.  Obviously, this film’s production was difficult given the death of star Paul Walker mid-shooting, and the last thing I wanted to do was badmouth him or this film.  No matter what kind of films he made or how he died, Walker was a person, and the life of a person demands respect.  That sentiment and the cast and crew’s personal loss colors this film, but it’s still a movie, and I still didn’t like it, as much as I cringe even writing that.

            Preceding all this, many people’s curiosity was piqued when James Wan, a horror auteur known for Saw, Insidious, and The Conjuring, was selected as the next director for the series.  An action film about a street racing crew seemed out of his wheelhouse, and while horror gives its directors plenty of opportunity for lavish style, the Fast & Furious films are lavish in an entirely different way.  They are essentially a string of action set pieces, the bigger the better, held loosely together by a faint plot.  Wan certainly understood the formula, as Furious 7 is chock full of ridiculously staged action that knows to focus more on making things look cool than having it make any sense.  One of the biggest sequences, which featured prominently in the trailers, is a scene where cars and drivers were dropped from a plane.  It is insane in every way; it could never happen in a world where physics exists, but it still gets your heart pounding.  Wan captured this and every other action sequence with well-staged shots and quick cuts, barraging audiences with thrilling images that pass by in such rapid succession that they rarely make sense or add up to any clear idea of what the hell is going on.  These thrills are quick and cheap (in the sense that they’re meaningless, not that they don’t cost a hell of a lot of money).  However, this is the same effect you would get from watching well-funded clips in quick succession.  It is not a movie.

            The loose plot that holds these sequences together involves the murderous revenge by the brother of a man the crew took down in a previous film.  The crew, led by Vin Diesel’s Dominic Toretto, bands together in a kill-or-be-killed situation that turns into one of the most cleanly convoluted plots I’ve seen in years.  It’s clean only because the characters explain in painfully repetitive exposition what the next step in the process is.  The process itself doesn’t make a lick of sense, which, admittedly, didn’t seem to be a goal of Furious 7.  It was much more genuine about its subplot surrounding Paul Walker’s Brian O’Conner struggling to settle into family life, juxtaposing that with how easily he operates in the impromptu family of the crew.  As Furious 7 is the opposite of subtle, they ram this down your throat by constantly referring to each other as family and having everyone talk about Brian’s conundrum.  It’s clunky because it was certainly added in after Walker’s death, but it’s mostly heartfelt, especially when it’s coming from Diesel’s mouth.

            Thankfully, Walker turned in a fine performance.  He sold the outrageous action well, as did most of the cast, and they looked good standing next to cars.  Little more was asked of them, and the few scenes that do contain human dialogue was rushed through so quickly that poor performances were hardly worth noting.

            Simply put, this movie is not for me.  I don’t care about cars or muscles or derrieres.  I’m bored by mindless action and momentary thrills, and most of all, I hate wooden characters, the ones that masquerade as people when their entire persona and relationships can be summed up in a single phrase (which one character actually does).  None of these things are charming to me, nor does it pass for mindless entertainment, which is what many people praise these films for being the epitome of.  Furious 7’s chosen idiocy actively offends even the most basic parts of my brain, and that just isn’t fun to me.

Other Notes

Ø  The title on the movie poster is Furious 7.  The title card on the movie is Furious Seven.  Did no one discuss how the title was going to be written?

Ø  This is the kind of movie where a character says they’re going to Dubai, then it cuts to them in Dubai, and there’s still text at the bottom of the screen indicating that it’s Dubai.  You know, in case you forgot what the character said five seconds ago.

Ø  I feel like crap writing this.  RIP Paul Walker