Delayed Reaction: The Godfather: Part II

The Pitch: What's better than a once in a generation mafia epic? A twice in a generation mafia epic.

The dual stories of Michael Corleone protecting the family business and his father starting it.

One of the more interesting cinematic discussions is the one surrounding The Godfather Part II: Can a sequel be better than the original? I know for some people, it's a hard "No", no exceptions. I get it. Movie quality really comes down to invention and execution. With a sequel, there's not much room for invention, so any sequel comes with a significant handicap. And, anything a sequel gets right can easily be attributed back to the original since it laid the foundation. There's also the simple question of if a movie needs another movie to function, can it really be superior?

I can't buy into that hard line stance. There's too many easy exceptions to the rule. The easiest is when the first movie is just a tryout. Mad Max is fine, but The Road Warrior follows through with George Miller's vision more fully. Batman Begins sets up Nolan's Batman universe, but The Dark Knight is clearly the high point. Similar arguments could be made about Spider-Man 1 & 2, The Evil Dead 1 & 2, and El Mariachi & Desperado. There's also many cases of filmmakers making a different kind of movie with the sequel. Alien is SciFi horror. Aliens is SciFi action. The Terminator and T2 are chase movies at very different levels. Captain America: The First Avenger is a period war movie whereas The Winter Soldier is a contemporary political thriller. The sequels that spark the most heated debates are those that deepen everything about the first film. Before Sunrise is a beautiful love story, but the two sequels use that foundation to go to much more intimate depths. The Toy Story movies continue to find ways to dig deeper into childhood and the struggle to find meaning. Without the original films, these sequels couldn't do this, but the sequels are able to go places that a single movie couldn't earn. And let's not forget sequels that reflect the filmmakers simply getting better at what they are doing as they go along. Few would argue that the first Harry Potter or Bourne movies are the best in the series. Those series had to figure themselves out over time.

(I'd be remiss to not mention that most sequels are clearly worst than the original. I could list bad or inferior sequels for hours)

The Godfather movies are more in the Star Wars or Lord of the Rings category: I simply can't separate the movies in my mind. They are of a piece. I didn't intend to watch the two Godfather movies back to back (relatively speaking). After I finished the first one though, it just felt natural that I'd go onto the second. Mind you, I won't be going on to watch Part III again. While it's not as bad as its reputation suggests, it's a massive drop off from the first two.If I had to pick between the two movies, I'd pick Part II as the better movie. That's entirely because Robert de Niro's Vito Corleone flashbacks are my favorite parts of either movie. Both films are unbelievably stacked with talent though. I really need these films to remind me how great Al Pacino can be. His last decade of work can cloud those memories. If The Godfather shows the high point of the Italian mafia, then the flashback structure of Part II allows it to cover both the rise and the initial signs of decline. Bother are more interesting stories to me.

The De Niro flashbacks are exactly what you want from an origin story. They hit the points they need to and don't overstay their welcome. It doesn't get too cute with foreshadowing things and doesn't over complicate how Vito rose to power. Coppola is smart to make sure the flashbacks aren't too substantial. If you cut together just the Vito scenes, they wouldn't really work on their own. They just add to what's happening in the present.

In the present, well, poor, poor Fredo.

I'm a much bigger fan of the Godfather movies with my second viewing than I was after my first. I still wouldn't call them personal favorites, but I won't fight anyone who wants to call them classics.

Verdict (?): Strongly Recommend

Movie Reaction: Won't You Be My Neighbor

Formula: Amy - drugs - drama - music - tragedy

I didn't grow up a Mr. Rogers fan. I avoided PBS shows as a kid. I had an unhealthy distrust of educational programming. I didn't like anything that prioritized education over entertainment. That probably explains a lot about how I turned out as an adult (or how I was built from day one depending on which side I the nature v. nurture argument you land on). I see the value now of Mr. Roger's Neighborhood and Fred Rogers in general. So, even though I lack a childhood fondness for the program, I was still looking forward to this documentary a lot.

I needed Won't You Be My Neighbor. It's starting to feel like there are no good people anymore and that there never really were any to begin with. The list of public figures who don't have some dark secret or past gets smaller and smaller by the day. Really, anyone in the public eye has something, it seems. It's nice to know there's at least someone, a man who has been dead for over a decade, who doesn't have something to hide.

There is nothing magical about Won't You Be My Neighbor. It's an exhaustive look at Fred Rogers. It covers as many facets of his life as it can in 90 minutes: his background, how his show began, behind the scenes, his family life, his personal philosophy, etc. Director Morgan Neville is a capable documentary filmmaker. He knows how to organize everything in a way that plays well. He doesn't focus on any topic for too long. He gets out of the way and let's Fred Rogers be the star.

The doc stops just short of a hagiography. It makes token gestures at revealing his flaws - he didn't handle a coworker coming out that well at first he got a little grumpy as he got older, and that's about it. It's not much, but it at least acknowledges flaws. I appreciate any documentary that's confident enough to poke a couple holes in its argument. No one is coming out of this thinking Fred Rogers was anything but a good man. Maybe if you came in with a grudge already, but really, who the hell is so surly that they want to spend effort going after Mr. Rogers?

I liked Won't You Be My Neighbor a good deal. It brought me close enough to tears to count once or twice. I came out of the film with a greater appreciation for his show and some of the bold choices he made in it. I never felt like I was being lectured and I left the theater feeling a little bit better about people in general. What more could I ask for?

Verdict (?): Strongly Recommend

Movie Reaction: Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom

Formula: Jurassic World - Jurassic Park

There's a point in any franchise when an important question must be asked: what is this franchise? It sounds obvious. The mega franchises that dominate the market right now make it look easy. The MCU is an interlocking universe of superheroes. Star Wars is the Jedi and the Force. Then again, look at the relative shortcomings of Solo. It's easy to lose track of a franchise and what made past installments work. Comedy sequels have the roughest time answering this question. Remember when The Hangover thought the franchise was the amnesia, not the rapport of three stars, and made that awful Thailand sequel? Horror franchises are all over the place with this. Sure, Freddy Kruger IS Nightmare of Elm Street. Then look at the first Halloween. Is Michael Meyers really what makes that series iconic? The Fast and Furious franchise restructured itself from drag racing to being about "the Family" in order to keep it going strong, eight movie strong. And let's not forget about Cars thinking Mater, not the racing, was the key to that franchise in Cars 2. This always looks easy in hindsight. The thing that defines a franchise isn't always reproducible in a sequel either. As great as Jennifer Lawrence is a Katniss, the titular Hunger Games are the high point of that series, which they couldn't keep falling back on. The Pirates of the Caribbean franchise kind of has to be about Jack Sparrow, but most people would agree that the sequels all relied too much on him.

Then there's Jurassic Park. The obvious answer to the franchise question is "the dinosaurs". I'm not sure that's the correct answer though. The biggest two movies in the franchise share the same conceit: there's a park with dinosaurs and everything goes wrong. Audiences eat that up. Both movies (Jurassic Park and Jurassic World), adjusted for inflation, have made over $700 million domestically. Back in 1997, The Lost World opened huge thanks to the Jurassic Park success. It didn't have the staying power of the first movie though when it moved the dinosaurs from the park to San Diego. In 2001, Jurassic Park III fell even more when it turned the franchise into a straight up adventure movie on the island. Having now seen Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, I'm starting to wonder if the park is just as vital to the franchise as the dinosaurs.

Fallen Kingdom takes place about three years after Jurassic World. The island that the park is located on is about to be destroyed by a volcanic eruption, and there's a worldwide policy debate about if it is humankind's responsibility to save the dinosaurs or let these unnatural creations die. Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) is contacted by Benjamin Lockwood (James Cromwell) to join a secret rescue mission. I don't know Lockwood's historical significance in the franchise (has he been mentioned before?). He's a co-founder of the park, but basically, he's a stand in for the deceased Richard Attenborough's John Hammond. Lockwood's secret mission is to send a group to the island to save a select group of dinosaurs before the island is destroyed. Claire convinces Owen (Chris Pratt) to join her as well as a couple of her coworkers - token tech genius, Franklin (Justice Smith), and paleo-veterinarian, Zia (Daniella Pineda). They go to the island, which is in full destruction mode already. When they arrive, they learn that the operation is much larger than they thought. Ken Wheatley (Ted Levine) is heading up a group of mercenary hunters to collect a lot of the dinosaurs. As you probably suspect, some nefarious things are going on. And this is all still the first act of the movie. I won't get into what happens next. Not because I want to avoid spoilers. I just think the rest is pretty dumb.

I came into Fallen Kingdom with strategically low expectations. I didn't need much out of it. I wanted some dinosaur action, nothing too plotty, and maybe some good Pratt/Howard banter. I didn't set a high bar, because I really wanted to turn my brain off and enjoy this. Despite a number of issues, I enjoyed Jurassic World back in 2015. I can't say the same about Fallen Kingdom.

I was excited when I heard that J.A. Bayona (The Orphanage, A Monster Calls, The Impossible) would be directing this movie. He has proven that he can execute harrowing set pieces (the tsunami in The Impossible) and knows how to deal with imposing, large creatures (the monster in A Monster Calls). He didn't bring much of that successfully to Fallen Kingdom. Instead, watching this reminded me of when I was a kid, making my first Powerpoint presentation for a school project. I used every single transition and animation I could find. The thing was a mess because I showed no restraint and didn't think "big picture" at all ("What do you mean I can't use the gunshot transition for slides about migrant workers during The Great Depression?"). That appears to be Bayona's approach: he uses all the things. He ends seemingly every scene like he wants it to be the iconic image for the movie. However, that ends up diluting the effect rather than amplifying it. Remember the shot of the T-Rex in the building at the end of Jurassic Park when it's doing that "this is my kingdom now" roar? Imagine if there were three or five scenes like that in Jurassic Park. Suddenly, that scene isn't as cool. Well, that's essentially what happens in Fallen Kingdom. Bayona totally over saturates the movie with cool ideas.

The easiest way to make this movie a lot of fun is to unleash Chris Pratt on it. Look at Parks & Rec or Guardians of the Galaxy. Good things happen when you let Chris Pratt riff and get loose. For some reason, Fallen Kingdom just wants Chris Pratt to be a generic action movie star. That's such a waste. Both Pratt and Howard are really, really bland in this. Howard doesn't even register as the same character she played in Jurassic World. Either of them could be replaced with someone else without changing the movie at all*. The same goes for every other character in the movie. They are all the generic version of their character type. No one surprised me. I get that the dinosaurs are what put people in the seats. Giving the movie nothing else to fall back on though leaves a slim margin of error for no good reason. It doesn't hurt the movie at all to populate it with interesting characters.

*Would anyone notice if they cast Channing Tatum and Riley Keough instead?

Speaking of the dinosaurs, they disappear for a good chunk in the middle of the movie. There's a bunch of them at the beginning in the scenes they use in the trailers when they are all running from the volcanic eruption. The a big sequence when they inevitably get loose at the end has all sorts of dinosaurs too. In the middle chunk of the movie, it's just a bunch of human stuff. As I've covered already, the humans in this are pretty dull, so the middle really drags.

Here's a criticism I don't pull out often. I hated the music in this movie. Normally I don't notice the music the first time I watch a movie. As long as it's mixed reasonably well, I focus on other aspects. Pretty early on I got distracted by the score to Fallen Kingdom. It tries way too hard to dictate the emotions of the scenes. Granted, this could be the fault of the direction or writing not executing properly, thus making the music feel out of place or overbearing. Whatever the case may be, it bothered me throughout. I was shocked to see in the end credits that the music was by Michael Giacchino. He's possibly the best composer around right now. He's done the music for some of the best Pixar movies (The Incredibles, Ratatouille, Up, Inside Out), LOST (one of the best scored shows I can think of), Rogue One, Zootopia, and so many others.

What most surprised me about the movie was how bored I was during the action sequences. I liked bits and pieces. The mayhem of the volcanic eruption was appropriately chaotic. That sequence ends with a good scene in the water when Claire and Franklin nearly drown. Otherwise, it was hard to get into it. Bayona has a lot of dino-fighting. It's loud and fast. They fight on rooftoops, small rooms, large rooms. Dinos fight each other. They mow down anonymous soldiers. There are a few obviously vile humans who get crowd pleasing demises. It's all missing one key element though: tension. Bayona doesn't seem to realize that dinosaurs are more terrifying when they are slow. All the dinosaurs in this run and chase and attack at all times. There's very little filmmaking skill being employed. It just wants to throw more in at all times. Jurassic World could get away with it because Collin Trevorrow had an entire park to go crazy in. Fallen Kingdom lacks that fallback.

Fallen Kingdom brings the series in the obvious thematic direction it's been going in since Jurassic Park. It's about man overstepping and nature fighting back. Underlining that message is literally the only use of Jeff Goldblum in this film*. The natural conclusion of the Jurassic Park franchise looks a lot like The Planet of the Apes. The filmmakers know what to do with the first chapter. There's this park. Things go wrong. Humans have to survive against these dinosaurs. Audiences immediately connect with that. As Jurassic World proved, it's impossible to mess that up, no matter how much inept plotting there is otherwise. If you take away the park, all that's left is the convoluted plotting. That's not good. I'm not sure Jurassic World 3 has anywhere to go but down. There's no more park. The leads lack any distinction. There isn't a good villain. The stakes are high, but in an anonymous way. That's a bad formula.

*Seriously, he only has two scenes and both are monologues. This movie is badly in need of some wry Goldblum quips.

Sometimes I hate doing reviews (I say like it's not something I do as a hobby), because I come off like I have a stick up my ass. I love a good, dumb movie. I don't think I have crazy high expectations for things. I try to meet a movie at its level. That said, I thought Fallen Kingdom was pretty dismal. Nothing in the execution worked for me. Bland characters. The story is convoluted as a whole and contrived in individual moments. The pacing is poor. Way too many of the dinosaur scenes were covered in volcanic spoke or took place at night in the rain (a lazy trick to cover up CGI). I'm looking for something about this movie that I can grab onto to forgive the rest and I'm coming up short. I'm amazed the reviews for this aren't even worse.

Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend

After the Credits

If my big issue with Jurassic World is that I don't believe a park like that would be run so poorly, then my issue with Fallen Kingdom is that I don't believe a secret high-tech facility would be run so poorly. I have nothing but questions about how inept this facility is. Why does it have brick walls to imprison powerful and reckless dinosaurs? How is one loose dinosaur able to take down the entire facility? Why are there no guards within earshot of where  Owen and Claire are being held; long enough for a dinosaur to repeatedly headbutt a hole into a brink wall? Does this place have no alarms or cameras anywhere? I don't understand how such a large scale operation could be run there without anyone in the house noticing beforehand. I must've misunderstood this, but did the little girl really sneak into the facility via dumbwaiter? I imagined that, right?

I don't really get the plan for luring Claire and Owen to the island either. They need her for her handprint and him to, I guess, get Blue to stand still for a couple seconds. Surely there's a different way to get into the computers there than bringing Claire only for a handprint. And what if she didn't happen to have a tech genius with her? What was the back up plan to get in? Thank god their flight didn't get delayed by an hour or two. There's wouldn't've been an island left. That's some lucky timing.

I got annoyed by the dinosaur auction for a lot of reasons. The bidding seemed really low to me. Wouldn't it be smarter to breed and sell as a renewable resource rather than sell them all off individually? Presumably, the auction has been going on for a while before the super-raptor gets introduced. Why is everyone gasping and afraid when they first see it? I get why the movie decides to have them gasp. They want to make a point about how vicious the super-raptor is. But really, that looks barely more vicious than any other dinosaurs. A T-Rex is bigger and more naturally imposing. Does it get any gasps? Or maybe have them gasp in terror at all the dinosaurs. That would've been my response. I'm a little confused about the timeline too. How do they make this super-raptor so quickly? Doesn't it need some time to grow? Were Owen and Claire locked away for weeks or months? I don't get it.

As long as I'm really unloading, one innocuous scene baffled me more than any other. So, the little clone girl is locked in her room. The movie eventually cuts to her knocking the key out of the door so she can open it. It's implied that she's been working at that for a while. So, she opens the door. looks out for about 5 seconds, closes the door, then sneaks out the window in her room. Why the hell didn't she start by sneaking out the window? What was the point of showing her unlock the door?

Again, sorry for picking so many nits. It's just rare that I see a movie that appears to be this poorly considered.