GRIN AND BEAR IT

 

MOVIE
Cocaine Bear
Director Elizabeth Banks
Review Ray Chan

Just when you thought every conceivable genre has been covered in the movie industry – from comedy to horror, from romance to drama, from westerns to space shenanigans – comes along a film like Cocaine Bear, so refreshingly different that it could indeed have created a new classification of its own. Attenborough adventures on acid, perhaps.
    The titular character is a 220kg (impressively CGI-ed) American black bear that accidentally snorts cocaine, and ends up pummeling his paws onto every unexpecting human who it encounters, creating an aisle of evisceration and entrails.
    This sublimely ridiculous romp is based (very loosely) on a true event in which a bear was found dead in the forest after sniffing in too much of the happy dust.
    The film opens with a drug smuggler liberally tossing bricks of crack from the side of his plane over Georgia’s Chattahoochee National Forest. After losing his footing and knocking himself unconscious, he plummets to his death in the suburbs of Tennessee.
    As fate would have it, much of the coke is unintentionally discovered and ingested by the bear, prompting it on a murderous rampage while on the hunt for her next fix of the white stuff. 
    Caught in the carnivore’s sights are a whole lot of varied individuals: protective mother Sari, who’s ventured into the woods to find her school truant daughter, Dee Dee and her best friend Henry; Daveed and Eddie, who are on a mission to find the missing cocaine for Eddie’s drug kingpin father, Syd (played by the late Ray Liotta); detective Bob, who is investigating the runner’s mysterious death; and no-nonsense park ranger Liz and her wildlife inspector crush Peter (Jesse Tyler Ferguson). 
    And that’s just for starters, with an array of other characters accidentally becoming victims of the bruin’s addled divergent demeanour, but who end up damaged, dissected or dead through one mishap after another. Indeed, prepare yourself for some of the most wildly imaginative and utterly ludicrous murders seen this year, especially one sublime sequence involving a speeding ambulance.
    But they’re just collateral to add to the body count. It’s evident that director Elizabeth Banks wants the audience to connect with the core group of characters she’s focusing on and it’s clear whose fate she wants viewers to give a damn about.
    At the end of the day, you’re here to see a gargantuan grizzly high on the white stuff rip up a dozen people with fitful abandon. Banks fully embraces the utter absurdity of the premise with fiendish fervour, doling out equal lashings of irreverent humour and gory violence, and creating a black comedy in the purest sense. 
    Cocaine Bear is entertaining with a capital E, absurd with a capital A, and farcical with a capital F. And, dammit with a capital D, if it isn’t one of the most deliciously enjoyable experiences inside a cinema this year.

#universal #cocainebear

GOOD TIME CHARLIES

MOVIE
Charlie's Angels
Kristen Stewart, Naomi Scott, Ella Balinska
Director Elizabeth Banks
Review Ray Chan

The newest revival of Charlie’s Angels seems an unnecessary commodity, one no-one really asked for.

    Barrymore, Diaz and Liu did it exceedingly well with the first run of reboots, so there seems little reason for this remake, apart from refreshing it for modern audiences (and no doubt hoping to make a pretty penny in the process).
    That being said, the movie pleasantly surprises and entertains, and is notable for being the first of the female-fronting crime drama series (on TV or in the movies) to be directed by a woman, Elizabeth Banks, who stars as one of the agency’s management team of Bosleys.
    The plot, unfortunately, is a trite hackneyed, involving once again some eager scientist developing modern technology which will be used against humanity. But we can forgive that for the rollicking romp that follows.
    Lead scientist of The Calisto project, Elena Houghlin (Scott), has serious concerns about a flaw that could weaponise the self-contained energy source that was aimed at revolutionising clean energy.
    After being disappointed that her superiors are more interested in profits than caution, she contacts the Charlie Townsend Spy Agency, soon realising the severity of the situation as she becomes the target of assassination.
    With former MI-6 Angel Jane Kano (Balinska) and deadly ditz Sabina Wilson (Stewart) assigned for her protection, and introduced to a world of secret weapons and spies with elite combat skills, Elena soon moves from fear to fascination as she joins the duo in tracking down the now-missing Calisto device in an attempt to recover and disarm, before sinister hands take hold.
    Along the way, a double cross occurs – perhaps predictably – but one that probably takes too long to reveal.
    Of all the girls, Stewart steals the show, partly because she has been given the most interesting character to work with.
    The charm and comedic timing of the Twilight star even improves on what Diaz and Barrymore were aiming for between their two characters.
    But really, everyone impresses. Overall, Charlie’s Angels is relentless in its effort to enjoy itself, as Banks injects the entire film with playfulness: the situations are absurd, the characters are over the top, the action scenes ludicrous (for example shooting upside down while hanging off a wildly careering vehicle) while the costumes are mostly fabulous.
    Watching Balinska and Stewart dance effortlessly to Donna Summer’s Bad Girls or goof around in a photo booth is uproarious fun, and even Banks rocks her pair of oversized sunglasses.
    The payoff at the end of the movie is worth waiting for. I won’t say how they are involved, but see if you can identify a number of sporting stars, celebrities and even former Angels.
    This movie rates a D: for being delightful yet derivative, but definitely one that delivers.

#charlie'sangels @sonypicturesaus