Divergents will destroy our society unless we destroy them.

The Divergent Series: Insurgent

(2015)

(SPOILERS) I quite enjoyed the first Divergent, mostly because Shailene Woodley gave a really strong performance, but also because Neil Burger managed to somehow drive the picture forward engagingly in spite of the nonsensical premise. Robert Schwentke picks up the reins for the sequel, and has no such luck. While the first 40 minutes are reasonable, it soon becomes apparent that Insurgent’s idea of plot progression is having Tris confront yet more bland, CGI-infused virtual realities.

I even preferred the first movie to the most recent instalment of that darling of YAs, The Hunger Games, but Insurgent really does everything in its power to support the view that the series is a poorly devised facsimile of any given dystopia, just one that’s more difficult to swallow. It will be interesting to see how the second Maze Runner does, since there was a picture that exceeded box office expectations but conversely had similar problems to Divergent in nursing negligible internal logic.

Here, we pick up soon after the original, with Tris, Four (Theo James), Peter (Miles Teller) and Caleb (Ansel Eglort) on the run. And that’s the best bit, really, with Jai Courtney well cast for a change as the psychopath on their heels. We also have Daniel Dae Kim obligingly putting Tris and Four on trial, and brother Caleb betraying sis in a subplot that’s never as potent as it should be, but for the most part this is about arch-bitch Kate Winslet trying to open an ornate box that isn’t, alas, the one from Hellraiser.

Naturally, Tris is the key; as a 100% divergent so she must take the test of being a five-quadrant faction special case, plunging into very obvious simulations and coming out with flying colours. But wait, wasn’t the whole point of the first movie that she could tell the difference between fake reality and real reality? Never mind, it’s the hook of the series, and nothing making any sense hasn’t stopped it before. As it turns out, the rather dull secret is that there is life beyond the wall and, since similar ideas have already been explored in The Giver and Maze Runner, probably no one’s that excited to find out in Astringent Parts 1 and 2.

For which, it appears Naomi Watts will be cashing the cheques Kate has surrendered, probably not the lesser of two evils son Four (no shit she had him young) hoped. Also back, poor Miles Teller who would prefer to make better use of his time (he shouldn’t be so miserable, he make more of an impression here than in Fantastic Four and gets the few witty lines).

Lionsgate must be licking their wounds a bit, wondering what went wrong with this series. Divergent was no Hunger Games, that was clear off the bat, but they probably had a reasonable expectations the franchise would find a growing audience, rather than a more expensive sequel to negligible extra return (slightly more globally, slightly less US). This is the studio’s last cash cow YA franchise (Hunger Games ends this year), but it looks like the milk’s run dry.

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She writes Twilight fan fiction.

Vampire Academy (2014)
My willingness to give writer Daniel Waters some slack on the grounds of early glories sometimes pays off (Sex and Death 101) and sometimes, as with this messy and indistinct Young Adult adaptation, it doesn’t. If Vampire Academy plods along as a less than innovative smart-mouthed Buffy rip-off that might be because, if you added vampires to Heathers, you would probably get something not so far from the world of Joss Whedon. Unfortunately inspiration is a low ebb throughout, not helped any by tepid direction from Daniel’s sometimes-reliable brother Mark and a couple of hopelessly plankish leads who do their best to dampen down any wit that occasionally attempts to surface.

I can only presume there’s a never-ending pile of Young Adult fiction poised for big screen failure, all of it comprising multi-novel storylines just begging for a moment in the Sun. Every time an adaptation crashes and burns (and the odds are that they will) another one rises, hydra-like, hoping…

Our very strength incites challenge. Challenge incites conflict. And conflict... breeds catastrophe.

The MCU Ranked Worst to Best

Why would I turn into a filing cabinet?

Captain Marvel (2019)
(SPOILERS) All superhero movies are formulaic to a greater or lesser degree. Mostly greater. The key to an actually great one – or just a pretty good one – is making that a virtue, rather than something you’re conscious of limiting the whole exercise. The irony of the last two stand-alone MCU pictures is that, while attempting to bring somewhat down-the-line progressive cachet to the series, they’ve delivered rather pedestrian results. Of course, that didn’t dim Black Panther’s cultural cachet (and what do I know, swathes of people also profess to loving it), and Captain Marvel has hit half a billion in its first few days – it seems that, unless you’re poor unloved Ant-Man, an easy $1bn is the new $700m for the MCU – but neither’s protagonist really made that all-important iconic impact.

My name is Dr. King Schultz, this is my valet, Django, and these are our horses, Fritz, and Tony.

Django Unchained (2012)
(MINOR SPOILERS) Since the painful misstep of Grindhouse/Death Proof, Quentin Tarantino has regained the higher ground like never before. Pulp Fiction, his previous commercial and critical peak, has been at very least equalled by the back-to-back hits of Inglourious Basterds and Django Unchained. Having been underwhelmed by his post Pulp Fiction efforts (albeit, I admired his technical advances as a director in Kill Bill), I was pleasantly surprised by Inglourious Basterds. It was no work of genius (so not Pulp Fiction) by any means, but there was a gleeful irreverence in its treatment of history and even to the nominal heroic status of its titular protagonists. Tonally, it was a good fit for the director’s “cool” aesthetic. As a purveyor of postmodern pastiche, where the surface level is the subtext, in some ways he was operating at his zenith. Django Unchained is a retreat from that position, the director caught in the tug between his all-important aesthetic pr…

I have discovered the great ray that first brought life into the world.

Frankenstein (1931)
(SPOILERS) To what extent do Universal’s horror classics deserved to be labelled classics? They’re from the classical Hollywood period, certainly, but they aren’t unassailable titans that can’t be bettered – well unless you were Alex Kurtzman and Chris Morgan trying to fashion a Dark Universe with zero ingenuity. And except maybe for the sequel to the second feature in their lexicon. Frankenstein is revered for several classic scenes, boasts two mesmerising performances, and looks terrific thanks to Arthur Edeson’s cinematography, but there’s also sizeable streak of stodginess within its seventy minutes.

Can you float through the air when you smell a delicious pie?

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
(SPOILERS) Ironically, given the source material, think I probably fell into the category of many who weren't overly disposed to give this big screen Spider-Man a go on the grounds that it was an animation. After all, if it wasn’t "good enough" for live-action, why should I give it my time? Not even Phil Lord and Christopher Miller's pedigree wholly persuaded me; they'd had their stumble of late, although admittedly in that live-action arena. As such, it was only the near-unanimous critics' approval that swayed me, suggesting I'd have been missing out. They – not always the most reliable arbiters of such populist fare, which made the vote of confidence all the more notable – were right. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is not only a first-rate Spider-Man movie, it's a fresh, playful and (perhaps) surprisingly heartfelt origins story.

Stupid adult hands!

Shazam! (2019)
(SPOILERS) Shazam! is exactly the kind of movie I hoped it would be, funny, scary (for kids, at least), smart and delightfully dumb… until the final act. What takes place there isn’t a complete bummer, but right now, it does pretty much kill any interest I have in a sequel.

Only an idiot sees the simple beauty of life.

Forrest Gump (1994)
(SPOILERS) There was a time when I’d have made a case for, if not greatness, then Forrest Gump’s unjust dismissal from conversations regarding its merits. To an extent, I still would. Just not nearly so fervently. There’s simply too much going on in the picture to conclude that the manner in which it has generally been received is the end of the story. Tarantino, magnanimous in the face of Oscar defeat, wasn’t entirely wrong when he suggested to Robert Zemeckis that his was a, effectively, subversive movie. Its problem, however, is that it wants to have its cake and eat it.

Do not mention the Tiptoe Man ever again.

Glass (2019)
(SPOILERS) If nothing else, one has to admire M Night Shyamalan’s willingness to plough ahead regardless with his straight-faced storytelling, taking him into areas that encourage outright rejection or merciless ridicule, with all the concomitant charges of hubris. Reactions to Glass have been mixed at best, but mostly more characteristic of the period he plummeted from his must-see, twist-master pedestal (during the period of The Village and The Happening), which is to say quite scornful. And yet, this is very clearly the story he wanted to tell, so if he undercuts audience expectations and leaves them dissatisfied, it’s most definitely not a result of miscalculation on his part. For my part, while I’d been prepared for a disappointment on the basis of the critical response, I came away very much enjoying the movie, by and large.

Just make love to that wall, pervert!

Seinfeld 2.10: The Statue
The Premise
Jerry employs a cleaner, the boyfriend of an author whose book Elaine is editing. He leaves the apartment spotless, but Jerry is convinced he has made off with a statue.

Now In Full Color, with a Happier Ending

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