The Avengers: Attack of the Giant Blockbuster Movie

The Avengers

Written and Directed By: Joss Whedon, from a story by Zak Penn and Whedon

Starring: Samuel L Jackson, Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddelston, Jeremy Renner, Scarlett Johansson, Clark Gregg, Cobie Smulders, Stellan Skarsgaard, and Gwyneth Paltrow

Director of Photography: Seamus McGarvey, Editor: Jeffery Ford and Lisa Lassek, Production Designer: James Chinlund, Original Music: Alan Silvestri

            For those who stuck around through the credits of Iron Man in the summer of 2008, they were treated to a post-credit sequence as a one-eyed Samuel L Jackson approached Robert Downey Jr., telling him about a special initiative. Who could expect that four years later, that gambit by Marvel would pay off in The Avengers? After a Hulk, a Thor, and a Captain America (and another Iron Man), Marvel has finally created the juggernaut of them all: A superhero movie that combines the biggest names with even bigger special effects. For those of us who have watched with continuing dread as Marvel launched an unstoppable wave of fan service films, tickling them with Easter eggs (instead of plot and characte), The Avengers has seemed like a time bomb in which film could finally be declared dead. The blockbusters have won.

            But fear not! Because while the Marvel machine might seem unstoppable, here comes writer-director Joss Whedon to reign in this whale of a movie. Whedon may not have worked in big budget scales before, but his importance to fandom is unparalleled, creating many memorable shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Firefly, as well as the brainchild of last month’s Cabin in the Woods. If anyone could stop The Avengers from train wreck potential, surely Whedon is the man for the job.

The Deep Blue Sea: A Romance Untamed

The Deep Blue Sea

Directed By: Terrence Davies

Written By: Terrence Davies, adapted from the play by Terrence Rattigan

Starring: Rachel Weisz, Tom Hiddleston, Simon Russell Beale, and Ann Mitchell

Director of Photography: Florian Hoffmeister, Editor: David Charap, Production Designer: James Merifield

            With the cinema of Terrence Davies, sometimes all it takes is one shot. The British director can say it all with one marvelous stroke of cinematic precision. In his latest feature, The Deep Blue Sea, it comes quite early. During the film’s abstract, almost wordless prologue, we see at one point the camera swirl around lovers Hester and Freddie, naked in bed, their bodies so perfectly aligned, they look like two puzzle pieces coming together. Halfway through the shot, Davies slowly cross-dissolves to the exact same shot, except we are back in the present, and Hester is alone. At this point, we don’t know what has happened to Freddie, but we can feel the tremendous sadness behind the eyes of Hester. She exalts a loss, which we learn is not one of physical proportions, but actually metaphysical; A love that simply cannot be kindled, with no hope of coming back.

            And in his first narrative film in over a decade, Davies captures the sublime, devastating tragedy of love in this adaptation of the play by Terrence Rafferty set in 1950s London. Davies has often been an autobiographical filmmaker—his first two features, Distant Voices, Still Lives and The Long Day Closes, play more like memory totems (as does his 2008 essay film, Of Time and the City). You get the sense that there is still some of Davies’s past creeping into The Deep Blue Sea through the background visuals, but most of the film is dedicated to these characters, which Davies inhabits with beauty, and devastating emotions in this day long narrative.

War Horse: Bonds Beyond the Trenches

War Horse

Directed By: Steven Spielberg

Written By: Lee Hall and Richard Curtis, based on the novel by Michael Morpurgo

Starring: Jeremy Irvine, Peter Mullan, Emily Watson, Niels Arestrup, David Thewlis, Tom Hiddleston, Benedict Cumberbatch, Celine Bickens, and Eddie Marsan

Director of Photography: Janusz Kaminski, Editor: Michael Khan, Production Designer: Rick Carter, Original Music: John Williams

Rated: PG-13 for war-related and horse-related violence.

            The usual argument that someone will come across when discussing the work of Hollywood blockbuster and box office king Steven Spielberg is that he’s a sentimentalist. His success, whether in terms of gigantic spectacle (Close Encounters, Jurassic Park) or serious drama (Schindler’s List, Munich) is that in the end, he’s somewhat of a pushover when it comes to trying to break through to our emotions, often going right for the artery in trying to activate our tear ducts.

            Certainly one can simplify what Mr. Spielberg does by that word, but I’ve always read it as something more complex. Instead, the filmmaker believes in the power that good can sometimes triumph over cynicism, often in the darkest of times. That if we believe, than realism need not matter, and the bonds we hold—between family, friends, or perhaps even strangers—are all we need.

            These themes run throughout the veins of War Horse, Mr. Spielberg’s second feature this holiday season (after his animated Adventures of Tintin). Adapted from the novel by Michael Morpurgo, though perhaps sent into production after the runaway success of the London stage adaptation now playing on Broadway, Mr. Spielberg’s narrative follows a titular horse from its trials with a poor family in the United Kingdom, before weaving through a number of stories during the First World War.

Thor: The God Who Fell to Earth

Thor

Directed By: Kenneth Branagh

Written By: Ashley Miller, Zack Stentz, and Don Payne

Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Tom Hiddleston, Anthony Hopkins, Stellan Skarsgard, Kat Dennings, Clark Gregg, and Idris Elba

Director of Photography: Haris Zambarloukos, Editor: Paul Rubell, Production Designer: Bo Wlech, Original MusicL Patrick Doyle

Rated: PG-13 for what all comic book movies must be rated for (silly violence and some humorous bad language)

            Marvel Entertainment is selling you something in Thor, and it’s not the movie you are watching, but the five other films that are coming out soon. Did you hear that reference to “Stark Industries”? Iron Man 3 in 2013! See Jeremy Renner as Hawkeye? He’s gonna have his own movie. And of course an after-credits sequence is setting up the big-bang-mash-em-up epic of The Avengers next year, which will bring together every super hero in the Marvel universe for one big extravaganza (read: most likely disaster).

            But until then, we have to actually get through Thor, perhaps the most unique character to join the Marvel universe alongside the science-built Iron Man and Incredible Hulk. A Norse God who comes from the magical kingdom in a parallel world (or something) called Asgard, Thor is unstoppable and wields awesome power with his magical hammer, Mjölnir. And thus Thor must be equipped with super human strength, played here by a pair of gigantic biceps, attached to the smirking face of Chris Hemsworth. Directed by Shakespearean thespian Kenneth Branagh, Thor is a mediocrely good time, which shows how much our standards have lowered for this type of entertainment more than the passable merit of the film.