Movie Nation

Kevin Hart, whatever the effort or lack of effort he’s putting into his movies these days, is box office gold — the new Chris Tucker. He’s made the leap from up and comer, the latest cast member from “Freaks and Geeks” to break out — to fat and happy quicker than anybody could have imagined.

“Ride Along,” his first star vehicle since his concert films turned into surprise hits the past couple of years, should make — get this — $45 million by the end of the long holiday weekend. That’s an MLK Weekend record.

Bad reviews, because it is a crappy movie and he needs to associate himself with writers who can give him funnier things to say and do, did not kill it. “Ride Along” is a smash.

“Lone Survivor” is battling “The Nut Job” (which also got bad reviews) for second place. Both should be in the mid-$20s.

And then there’s “Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit,” the best-reviewed new movie of the weekend. It isn’t bombing, but $18-19 million by Monday? Not much return on Paramount’s investment. Mishandled.

“The Legend of Hercules” fell out of the top ten. That’s got to be some kind of record, too.

“August: Osage County” and “Her” got nice Oscar nomination bounces. “Saving Mr. Banks” took an Oscar related (no big nominations) hit.

“Devil’s Due,” a weak-tea horror picture, looks to make $10 million by weekend’s end.

Paramount did itself no favors by showing “Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit” to a few New York and LA and trade publication critics in advance, and stiffing the rest of us with screenings after deadline.

The first wave of reviews — and really, there wasn’t a critic in that lot I’d call “elite” — panned it. But now, after everybody has seen it, it’s sitting in the positive reviews realm. It’s not terrible, and it is a tribute to America’s reviewing class that we didn’t pre-judge the movie as crap simply because Paramount was hiding it. Let’s hope the studio realizes that. Now.

“The Nut Job” is earning awful notices, which I attribute to critics refusing to treat animation as kids’ fare. This one certainly is, and is much more entertaining and audience friendly than much of what’s been shoved down parents’ throats the past year or two. I liked it more than most, but reviews won’t be helping this one.

“Ride Along” is more proof that Kevin Hart has gotten rich and happy and lost a lot of the edge he seemed to have a couple of years ago. A star-vehicle cop buddy movie, and he doesn’t deliver the goods. Not funny, weak writing, a slow-paced film that doesn’t catch him at his most manic. Tim Story deserves a big chunk of the blame here. Terrible reviews for this one, across the board.

“Devil’s Due” is an occasionally scary but uninvolving, soulless “impregnated by the Devil” thriller. Some cool effects, but blase performances create characters we don’t care about. Poor reviews for this one.

The dog knows. The dog always knows in movies about the Devil, because there’s the scent of Satan in the air.

Maverick, a Setter, knows that something’s up with Samantha’s mysterious, post-honeymoon in Santo Domingo pregnancy. Her OB-GYN may not have a clue, and her videotape EVERYthing husband (Zach Gilford of “Friday Night Lights”) may be slow on the uptake.

But Maverick gets it, and long before the Devil’s due date in “Devil’s Due.”

Fifteen years after “The Blair Witch Project” brought “found footage” into the film vocabulary, “Devil’s Due” serves up a “Rosemary’s Baby” variation of the formula. A police interrogation (videotaped) of bloodied, shocked Zach frames the story. And wedding video, home movies, closed circuit supermarket cameras (capturing Samantha devouring raw meat, and the shocked reactions of customers) and Satanist surveillance footage make up most — but not all (the filmmakers break format) — of this rarely hair-raising thriller about the ultimate “problem pregnancy.”

Sam (Allison Miller), an orphan with “no family,” marries Zach and they dash off to the Caribbean for a honeymoon. A night of partying, a too-helpful taxi driver who offers to take them someplace “special” and authentic, and snatches of Zach’s video footage of the ritual that happened to them after they blacked out from the drinks tell us, but not them, what is going on.

A Santo Domingo palm reader tries to warn them — “No family, no past, you were born for death,” she intones. “THEY’ve been WAITING!”

We already know who “they” are because of the Biblical  “Antichrist” passage quoted in the opening credits. And the waiting involves, what, nine months or so?

“Something’s wrong,” Sam keeps protesting about this baby. But Zach, video-mad Zach, takes forever to start looking back over his footage and figuring all this out.

A handful of high-end special effects lift this generic demonic possession tale, and a few killer scenes work — a Lamaze class where Samantha’s fetus gives the other women contractions, a First Communion celebration turned bloody by that thing growing in Samantha’s womb, the aforementioned supermarket scene (funny), Samantha’s super villain-sized explosions of temper.

The dialogue is dull, the performances perfunctory and while it is novel to leave out “the explainer” character — that slim hope that a priest, an expert on the Occult or whoever, can give the characters answers — common to this genre, robs the film of pathos and urgency. There’s no “We have to stop this from happening” because nobody knows what’s happening or that it should be stopped.

Except for the dog. And he’s not talking. He’s just hoping that unlike so many dogs in so many Satan-scented cinematic possession pictures, he gets to survive to the final credits.

MPAA Rating: R for language and some bloody images

Cast: Allison Miller, Zach Gilford, Sam Anderson

Credits: Directed by Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, Tyler Gillett, written by Lindsay Devlin. A 20th Century Fox release.

Running time: 1:29

Well, “All is Lost” plainly didn’t make enough money and have enough legs to give Robert Redford his last legitimate shot at a best actor Oscar. Bummer. His audience is as old as he is, and that wasn’t a help. He represents a tiny minority in a younger Academy.

The 86th Academy Awards will be a bit poorer for it.

Emma Thompson, Tom Hanks and “Saving Mr. Banks” were no shows. Hanks certainly deserved a nomination for “Captain Philips,” as did director Paul Greengrass.

Meryl Streep and Julia Roberts pulled nominations for the showy and maudlin melodrama “August: Osage County.” I guess being big and broad and loud pays off. The movie got no writing, directing or “best picture” nomination. They wasted these two nominations on an inferior film.

They only nominated nine best pictures for best picture in a year when “All is Lost”, “Saving Mr. Banks,” just the first two possibles to come to mind that seemed to have a shot, were left out.

Scorsese was nominated for a hot, hotly-debated film that falls into his second or third rank of accomplishments.

Daniel Bruhl, nominated for “Rush” at the Golden Globes, no best supporting actor nomination here.

“Star Trek Into Darkness” got a visual effects nomination.

All of the best picture nominees date from late in the year, so no “Butler,” “Mud” or “Fruitvale Station” or any summer film and barely any fall films had a shot. Short attention spans. No “Fruitvale”? Really?

Pleasant surprise? Jonah Hill’s best supporting actor nomination for “Wolf of Wall Street,”  June Squibb recognized for “Nebraska,” which she pretty much stole.

“The Hunt” is the best of the foreign films I’ve seen, “The Great Beauty” is the most recent. Guess which one will win?

“Blackfish” was worked and worked for a best documentary nomination, and Hollywood dodged it. Let the outrage begin.

“20 Feet from Stardom” got in instead, the slight “Cutie and the Boxer,” and a trio of docs that most filmgoers, and critics, haven’t even heard of. Nicely done, doc branch.

A big day for Steve Coogan, whose “Philomena” earned adapted screenplay, actress and best picture nominations. Nice.

Oprah and “The Butler” bombed out.

“Inside Llewyn Davis” had no real shot at anything huge, as I have been saying all along.  Cinematography is the biggest nod that one earned.

“The Grandmaster” picked up a few choice technical nominations, “Gatsby” earned a costumes nomination.

I’ll bet, with all the revived Woody Allen-child molester blowback, they’re regretting nominating him for the dated, talky, tone-deaf “Blue Jasmine” script. At least he won’t show up. At least he doesn’t have a shot at winning. Spike Jonze (“Her”) all the way.

Five  nominees for best animated film? “Ernest & Celestine” is the odd man out. “Frozen,” “Croods” “Despicable Me 2” and Miyazaki’s “The Wind Rises” are the real contenders.

“American Hustle” and “Gravity” pulled 10 nominations, “12 Years a Slave” 9.

The 86th Academy Awards will be handed out MAr. 2.

Best picture
“12 Years a Slave”
“The Wolf of Wall Street”
“Captain Phillips”
“Her”
“American Hustle”
“Gravity”
“Dallas Buyers Club”
“Nebraska”
“Philomena”

Best director
Steve McQueen — “12 Years a Slave”
David O. Russell — “American Hustle”
Alfonso Cuaron — “Gravity”
Alexander Payne — “Nebraska”
Martin Scorsese — “The Wolf of Wall Street”

Best actor
Bruce Dern — “Nebraska”
Chiwetel Ejiofor — “12 Years a Slave”
Matthew McConaughey — “Dallas Buyers Club”
Leonardo DiCaprio — “The Wolf of Wall Street”
Christian Bale — “American Hustle”

Best actress
Amy Adams — “American Hustle”
Cate Blanchett — “Blue Jasmine”
Judi Dench — “Philomena”
Sandra Bullock — “Gravity”
Meryl Streep — “August: Osage County”

Best supporting actor
Barkhad Abdi — “Captain Phillips”
Bradley Cooper — “American Hustle”
Jonah Hill — “The Wolf of Wall Street”
Jared Leto — “Dallas Buyers Club”
Michael Fassbender — “12 Years a Slave”

Best supporting actress
Jennifer Lawrence — “American Hustle”
Lupita Nyong’o — “12 Years a Slave”
June Squibb — “Nebraska”
Julia Roberts — “August: Osage County”
Sally Hawkins — “Blue Jasmine”

Best original screenplay
“American Hustle” — David O. Russell and Eric Warren Singer
“Blue Jasmine” — Woody Allen
“Her” — Spike Jonze
“Nebraska” — Bob Nelson
“Dallas Buyers Club” — Craig Borten and Melisa Wallack

Best adapted screenplay
“12 Years a Slave” — John Ridley
“Before Midnight” — Julie Delpy, Ethan Hawke and Richard Linklater
“The Wolf of Wall Street” — Terence Winter
“Captain Phillips” — Billy Ray
“Philomena” — Steve Coogan and Jeff Pope

Best animated feature
“The Wind Rises”
“Frozen”
“Despicable Me 2”
“Ernest & Celestine”
“The Croods”

Best foreign feature
“The Hunt” (Denmark)
“The Broken Circle Breakdown” (Belgium)
“The Great Beauty” (Italy)
“Omar” (Palestinian territories)
“The MIssing Picture” (Cambodia)

Best documentary feature
“The Act of Killing”
“20 Feet From Stardom”
“The Square”
“Cutie and the Boxer”
“Dirty Wars”

Best music (original song)
“Frozen”: “Let it Go” — Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez
“Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom”: “Ordinary Love” — U2, Paul Hewson
“Her”: “The Moon Song” — Karen O, Spike Jonze
“Despicable Me 2”: “Happy” — Pharrell Williams

Best Original Score
Steven Price, “Gravity”
Alexandre Desplat, “Philomena”
William Butler and Owen Pallett, “Her”
John Williams, “The Book Thief”
Thomas Newman, “Saving Mr. Banks”

Best Sound Editing
“Gravity”
“Captain Phillips”
“All is Lost”
“The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug”
“Lone Survivor”

Best Sound Mixing
“Gravity”
“Captain Phillips”
“The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug”
“Inside Llewyn Davis”
“Lone Survivor”

Best Production Design
“American Hustle”
“Gravity”
“The Great Gatsby”
“Her”
“12 Years a Slave”

Best Cinematography
“Gravity”
“The Grandmaster”
“Inside Llewyn Davis”
“Nebraska”
“Prisoners”

Best Makeup And Hairstyling
“Dallas Buyers Club”
“Bad Grandpa”
“The Lone Ranger”

Best Costume Design
“The Great Gatsby”
“The Grandmaster”
“American Hustle”
“The Invisible Woman”
“12 Years a Slave”

Best Film Editing
“Gravity”
“12 Years a Slave”
“Captain Phillips”
“American Hustle”
“Dallas Buyers Club”

Best Visual Effects
“Gravity”
“The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug”
“Iron Man 3”
“The Lone Ranger”
“Star Trek Into Darkness”

“Alone Yet Not Alone”: “Alone Yet Not Alone” — Bruce Broughton, Dennis Spiegel

Tom Clancy’s C.I.A. analyst-hero Jack Ryan returns to the screen in a workmanlike if unoriginal and uninspiring reboot — “Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit.”
Hardcore fans of espionage thrillers will recognize it as on a par with the least of the Jason Bourne films, sort of “Bond Lite,” a prequel about how Jack Ryan wasn’t just some mild-mannered numbers cruncher and desk jockey when he first joined the agency. But director Kenneth Branagh, his new Ryan (Chris Pine) and co-stars Kevin Costner as Jack’s handler and Keira Knightley as the woman Jack hides his true career from make sure that it’s never less than efficient and reasonably entertaining.
This Ryan was an economics student in Britain when 9/11 happened, a smart cookie who enlisted in the Marines, was crippled in combat and met his lady love (Knightley) while in rehab. Costner plays Harper, a mysterious Navy commander.
“I’m in the C.I.A.,” he whispers, to Jack’s amusement.
Harper recruits Jack to be a C.I.A. agent working (illegally) on Wall Street, sniffing around his bank for shady terrorist deposits. Clancy would have never made that sort of basic violation of the C.I.A. charter, but hey, a Brit directed so what can you do? And playing up Ryan’s military background makes his ability to handle himself in life-or-death brawls less surprising than the Alec Baldwin and Harrison Ford versions of the character. This guy is closer to Liam Neeson’s “Taken” man of “particular skills” than a “Three Days of the Condor” fish out of water.
Jack gets wind of gigantic Russian holdings of U.S. currency, holdings that can only do us harm if they sell them all at once. So Harper ships his desk jockey to Moscow to pry the truth out of Russian oligarch Vitkor Cherevin, played by Branagh.
“They aren’t a country, they’re a corporation,” Harper gripes, a lefty sentiment the right winger Clancy would never have approved. But he would have liked having the Russians plot the downfall of capitalism through terror and market manipulation.
“You Americans like to think of yourselves as direct,” Cherevin growls. “Perhaps you are just rude.”
“You Russians like to think yourselves poets,” Ryan purrs back. “I wonder if you’re just…touchy.”
There’s a ticking clock to the proceedings, the fiance thinks Jack is cheating on her, she gets mixed up in his business and we get a taste of Keira in cocktail wear in sexy, glitzy Moscow, and Branagh does his best hissing, no lips Russian villain, one who answers to former ballet star Mikhail Baryshnikov, as a Kremlin insider.
Working in the film’s favor — the performances. Knightley does an American accent, and everybody has a great rapport with everybody else — Costner with Pine, Pine with Knightley, Knightley with Branagh. It’s a film of romantic and dramatic close-ups of actors in dialogue scenes, jumpy, jerky photography edited into a blur in the action beats.
Working against it — that famed Clancy precision, the technology that never fails, the tradecraft that has spies prepared for any contingency. And sadly, once it breaks that spell of omnipotence, the movie turns even more predictable — car chases, shoot outs, a manic hunt for terror suspects.
“Shadow Recruit” is a January movie, which lowers expectations considerably. If they’d had much hope for it, the film would have merited a Christmas or late spring release. But that said, Branagh & Co. keep up appearances with a thriller that works mainly because all of its parts — locations, fights and plot twists — are well worn from all the thrillers they’ve been in before.
　
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for sequences of violence and intense action, and brief strong language
Cast: Chris Pine, Keira Knightley, Kevin Costner, Kenneth Branagh, Mikhail Baryshnikov
Credits: Directed by Kenneth Branagh, written by Adam Kozad and David Koepp. A Paramount release.
Running time: 1:45

A little Kevin Hart goes a long way in “Ride Along,” a dull buddy picture
engineered as a vehicle for the mini motor mouth and the perma-sneering Ice
Cube.
It’s mismatched cops on patrol in Atlanta in this “48 Hours/Bad
Boys/Showtime/The Hard Way” action comedy where four screenwriters tried to find
funny bug-eyed rants for the normally-amusing Hart to deliver in between shoot
outs and chases. But as producers of assorted Jim Carrey, Will Ferrell and Eddie
Murphy movies could have told them, just pointing the camera at a funny guy is
never enough to save a lame, worn out idea. 
Cube, whose career seemed over after one too many “Are We There Yet?”
sequels, is cranky cop James whose pursuit of a mysterious villain named Omar is
interrupted by his sister’s fiance. That would be Ben (Hart), a video
game-addicted school security guard who longs to bring his wise-cracking/voice
cracking banter to the Atlanta P.D. James drags Ben on a ride-along just to
convince the dude he isn’t cut out for police work and that he isn’t good enough
for Jame’s supermodel sister (Tika Sumpter, all legs and shorts and cleavage and
hair products).
James figures sis should dating an Atlanta Falcon, an Atlanta Brave “or even
somebody from the Hawks.” Instead, she’s hooked up with this sweet talking
shrimp who’s “about one chromosome away from being a midget.”
No, James isn’t politically correct.
He drags Ben along for a “Training Day” of botched interventions with bikers,
silliness at the shooting range and a strip club shootout. Because there’s no
such thing as a cop buddy movie without a trip to a strip club.
Even by the standards of this well-worn genre, “Ride Along” is a lazy movie,
insulting the audience by letting us stay five steps ahead of the hack
screenwriters.

At several points, Hart takes center stage, plants his feet and unloads on a
student headed down the wrong path, on a biker moll who has more facial hair
than he can manage, etc. Sometimes, he finds a laugh or two. Often, these
ranting monologues run out of gas before they start. His girlish shrieks at the
first sign of danger are funnier, but not by much. And you start to wonder if
Ice Cube’s feigned irritation with him involved any acting at all.
Hart has been funny in one concert film and in supporting parts — a few
killer scenes where he comes in, lands laughs, and splits — in everything from
TV’s “Freak and Geeks” to “Think Like a Man” and last summer’s “This is the
End.” But as this film, and his boring bit part in “Grudge Match” proved, a
little of the little man is pretty much all we can stand unless he finds
somebody who can write for him.

MPAA Rating: PG-13 for sequences of violence, sexual content and brief strong
language
Cast:  Kevin Hart, Ice Cube, John Leguizamo, Tika Sumpter, Bruce McGill,
Laurence Fishburne

Credits: Directed by Tim Story, written by Greg Coolidge, Jason Mantzoukas,
Phil Hay and Matt Manfredi. A Universal release. 
<Running time: 1:40

Here are your Golden Raspberry (Razzie) nominations for the calendar year 2013.

As I have mentioned elsewhere, it was a banner year for not just good movies, but really bad ones as well.

I used to vote in this “contest,” but a couple of times it has seemed as if the crew in charge has been corrupted, c-opted or maybe just drunk as they consider the field of potential nominees. That year that Sandra Bullock showed up to accept, seeing as how she was about to win the Oscar for “Blind Side” and thus could be magnanimous (and show us she doesn’t take herself seriously) was kind of a shark jumping moment.

This year, the “34th Razzies?”  Pretty close to on the money. I doubt if Johnny Depp shows up to accept. Or Salma Hayek. Well, maybe Salma. Adam Sandler ought to be up for some sort of lifetime achievement honors. But maybe that’s just me

WORST PICTURE

• After Earth

• Grown Ups 2

• The Lone Ranger
• 
A Madea Christmas

• Movie 43

WORST ACTOR

• Johnny Depp: The Lone Ranger
• Ashton Kutcher: Jobs
• Adam Sandler: Grown Ups 2
• Jaden Smith: After Earth
• Sylvester Stallone: Bullet To The Head, Escape Plan, Grudge Match

WORST ACTRESS

• Halle Berry: Movie 43, The Call
• Selena Gomez: Getaway
• Lindsay Lohan: The Canyons
• Tyler Perry: A Madea Christmas
• Naomi Watts: Diana, Movie 43

WORST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

• Lady Gaga: Machete Kills
• Salma Hayek: Grown Ups 2
• Katherine Heigl: The Big Wedding
• Kim Kardashian: Tyler Perry’s Temptation
• Lindsay Lohan: In-App-Propriate Comedy, Scary Movie 5

WORST SUPPORTING ACTOR

• Chris Brown: Battle Of The Year
• Larry the Cable Guy: A Madea Christmas
• Taylor Lautner: Grown Ups 2
• Will Smith: After Earth
• Nick Swardson: A Haunted House, Grown Ups 2

WORST DIRECTOR

• The 13 People Who Directed Movie 43
• Dennis Dugan: Grown Ups 2
• Tyler Perry: A Madea Christmas, Temptation
• M. Night Shyamalan: After Earth
• Gore Verbinski: The Lone Ranger

WORST SCREEN COMBO

• The Entire Cast of Grown Ups 2
• The Entire Cast of Movie 43
• Lindsay Lohan & Charlie Sheen: Scary Movie 5
• Tyler Perry & EITHER Larry the Cable Guy OR That Worn-Out Wig & Dress: A Madea Christmas
• Jaden Smith & Will Smith on Planet Nepotism: After Earth

WORST SCREENPLAY

• After Earth: Screenplay by Gary Whitta and M. Night Shyamalan, Story by Will Smith
• Grown Ups 2: Written by Fred Wolfe & Adam Sandler & Tim Herlihy
• The Lone Ranger: Screen Story & Screenplay by Ted Elliott, Justin Haythe & Terry Rosso
• A Madea Christmas: Written by Tyler Perry
• Movie 43: Written by 19 “Screenwriters”

WORST REMAKE, RIP-OFF or SEQUEL

• Grown Ups 2
• 
Hangover III

• The Lone Ranger
• 
Scary Movie 5

• Smurfs 2

If you’re going to make cartoons about critters, the late  Chuck “Looney
Toons” Jones used to preach, build them around the animal’s chief concern —
survival. Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck are always avoiding the shotgun and the stew
pot. Wile E. Coyote is desperate for a dinner of road runner.
That principle pays off in “The Nut Job,” a surprisingly simple, funny and
often cute slapstick comedy about a squirrel planning a nut heist so that he’ll
have enough food to last through winter.
Surly (Will Arnett, the perfect voice for cartoons) has always lived just for
himself, which irks the other animals of Liberty Park. Chipmunks and mice, moles
and groundhogs, they all stock up for the winter, collectively, in a system
overseen by Racoon (Liam Neeson). But Surly and his silent rat pal Buddy are
every animal-for-himself guys. Surly’s schemes never involve sharing.
“I don’t need anybody.”
Contrast Surly with his fellow squirrel Grayson (Brendan Fraser), because the
red squirrel Andie (Katherine Heigl) and every other animal in the park does.
The dashing, dopey Grayson is all about heroics, and looking good as he saves
the day.
An epic failure to steal a street vendor’s nut cart gets Surly labeled “a
clear and present danger” to the others, so he is banished from the park. He
destroyed the other animals’ winter survival stash. Is Surly — con artist,
thief and bully to pigeons — anxious to make good on what he’s cost everyone?
Not on your life.
And when he runs across the shop that the nut cart came from, he figures this
huge stash is his. It’ll take blackmail by Andie, or worse, to get him to share.
But Surly’s caper runs right up against what the human owners of the nut shop
have in mind. They’re wise guys out to rob the bank across the street. The
animals, with Surly’s grudging cooperation, must race the robbers to see who can
pull off his heist first.
The sight gags have a marvelous thunder-clap suddenness to them. Yeah, we can
see the squirrel smacked against the windshield stuff coming. But animated
movies live and die on their pace, and this one clips along.
The one-liners aren’t the best — “Is that mange, or Bubonic Plague you’re
wearing?” But there are just enough of them to get by.
Visual riffs on cops and donuts, the poor choice of pug as guard dog (Maya
Rudolph), a violently testy Girl Scout and plenty of “throw nuts and squirrels
at the 3D screen” jokes make “The Nut Job” kid-friendly.

And if that fails to do the trick, throw in a few cut-the-cheese jokes. Yeah,
groundhogs are flatulent.

Veteran animator Peter Lepeniotis, a Pixar vet expanding a short film he made
years ago, ensures that the animation is quite good. And there’s an adorable
closing credits dance-off that underlines the film’s Korean production lineage.

So no, it’s not Pixar or Dreamworks or Disney or Blue Sky. But “The Nut Job”
is still better than any animated film released in the doldrums of January has a
right to be.

MPAA Rating: PG for mild action and rude humor
Cast:  The voices of Will Arnett, Katherine Heigl, Maya Rudolph and Liam
Neeson
Credits: Directed by  Peter Lepeniotis, written by Lorne Cameron, Daniel Woo
and  Peter Lepeniotis. An Open Road release.
Running time: 1:25