Rio crew hurtled to the wilds of the Amazon

Neptune Theatre

Grand Budapest Hotel

****

Stars: Ralph Fiennes, F. Murray Abraham, Mathieu Amalric

Director: Wes Anderson

Rated: R

Showing: Fri 7:30pm. Sat 7pm. Sunday 5:30pm. Mon to Weds 7:30pm. Thurs 7pm.

Runtime: 100 minutes

Comedy.

I’m not sure what the formal definition of a masterpiece is, but The Grand Budapest Hotel strikes me as something very close. Wes Anderson, who wrote and directed those modern classics The Royal Tenenbaums and Moonrise Kingdom, now gives us Downton Abbey on laughing gas.

Sophisticated, silly and wildly incident-packed, it creates a mad rumpus at centre stage while hinting at tragedies waiting in the wings. There are fantastically-elaborate comic set-pieces, obsessively detailed puppet-theatre art direction, and brilliantly crafted action sequences.

This rare fusion of technical rigour and madcap wit seals Anderson’s claim on the title of America’s finest comic filmmaker.

It’s sheer screwball delight from one of the most original and brilliantly funny filmmakers ever to work in Hollywood. 

Rio 2 in 2D

***

Stars: Jesse Eisenberg, Anne Hathaway, Jemaine Clement

Director: Carlos Saldanha

Rated: PG

Showing: Fri to Sun 2:30pm. Mon to Thurs 5pm.

Runtime: 101 minutes

Animation/comedy.

It’s a jungle out there for Blu, Jewel and their three kids in RIO 2, after they’re hurtled from that magical city to the wilds of the Amazon. As Blu tries to fit in, he goes beak-to-beak with the vengeful Nigel, and meets the most fearsome adversary of all - his father-in-law. All our favorite Rio characters are back, and they’re joined by Oscar (R) nominee Andy Garcia, Grammy (R) winner Bruno Mars, Tony (R) winner Kristin Chenoweth and Oscar/Emmy (R)/Tony winner Rita Moreno. Rio 2 also features new Brazilian artists and original music by Janelle Monae and Wondaland.  

Liberty Theatre

The Amazing Spiderman 2 in 3D

***

Stars: Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Jamie Foxx

Director: Marc Webb

Rated: PG-13

Showing: Fri 2:30pm/7pm. Sat 2:30pm/6pm/9:30pm. Sun 1pm. Mon to Thurs 2:30pm/6pm. X-Men: Days of Future Pass in 3D shows on Thurs, May 22 at 10pm.

Runtime: 142 minutes

Action, adventure, fantasy.

Amazing 2 is a violent film, with blood and death in between the digitally-animated brawls. Human bodies are tortured and broken, and there’s not always a web slinger there to stop that flipping police car, that hurtling bus, that Russian psychopath or that jet that’s about to crash.

Things tend to drag as director Marc Webb has problems with focus, keeping the many story threads straight with  continuity (watch Gwen Stacy’s outfits). 

Many otherwise faceless extras pop off the screen as if he’s about to give their nameless characters the same significance as Stan Lee himself — who always has cameos in these Marvels.

But Andrew Garfield finds his voice as the main character, making his second try at Peter Parker, a caffeinated wise-cracker, enjoying his notoriety, talking to himself just like the guy in the comic book. He’s funny.

Jamie Foxx is an ignored, humiliated electrical engineer who has an accident involving electric eels and power lines. 

That transforms him from a Spiderman fanboy into a glowing blue guy in a hoodie. In the ethos of this movie, Peter / Spidey reasons with the tormented villains, trying to connect with the doomed rich kid (Osborn) or this “nobody” engineer.

And while Garfield and Stone have a nice sass to their scenes, Webb can do nothing to give this relationship the longing and heat of the Kirsten Dunst / Tobey Maguire moments from the earlier films. So while this “Spider-Man” is, if anything, more competent than the first film, it’s still not one that demands that you stick around after the credits. There’s nothing there. 

Speciality Theatre

Godzilla

****

Stars: Aaron Taylor Johnson, Elizabeth Olsen, Bryan Cranston.

Director: Gareth Edwards.

Rated: PG-13

Showing: Fri, Sat 2:30pm/6:15pm/9:30), (3D). Sunday 2pm/5pm/8pm), (3D). Mon to Thurs 2:30pm (2D)/6pm (3D)/9pm (2D).
Runtime: 123 minutes

Action/adventure/scifi.

I came to the new “Godzilla” with monster-sized expectations, enhanced by cherished childhood memories of stunt men in dinosaur suits stomping Tokyo and a lifelong love of the fantastic fire-breathing nuclear dragon that, after 60 years, remains Japan’s most famous movie export.

The two pre-release trailers for director Gareth Edwards’ new $160 million Godzilla reboot stoked anticipation. Brilliantly edited, with glimpses of the monster kept to a minimum, the trailers conjured a sense of awe and dread, and promised to restore the fearsomeness and majesty of a monster conceived as the embodiment of Atomic Age wrath and introduced only nine years after the 1945 devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

It is in this context of hope — always a danger for a movie fan, more so a movie critic — that I report that the new Godzilla is a goodzilla, not a greatzilla.

Neighbours

**

Stars: Seth Rogen, Rose Byrne, Zac Efron.

Director: Nicholas Stoller.

Rated: R

Showing: Fri & Sat 2:45pm/6pm/9pm. Sunday 2:15pm/5:15pm/8:15pm. Mon to Thurs 2:45/6:15pm/8:45pm
Runtime: 96 minutes

Comedy.

Neighbors is an Animal House for The Hangover era, a frat-boy comedy that pushes the rude and raunchy envelope into daring and dirty new territory.

Hilariously coarse, reasonably shrewd and clumsily sentimental, there’s no reason it won’t earn a billion and inspire a whole new generation of party-hearty “bros” to go Greek when they go to college.