The Mummy: Tomb Of The Dragon Emperor (2008)

The third instalment in this particular selection of Mummy-centric tales, focusing on heroic Rick O'Connell (Brendan Fraser) and his family, is pretty much what you'd expect it to be, considering the turnaround behind the cameras. It's now Rob Cohen directing, and the writing duties have been taken over by Alfred Gough and Miles Millar, but the central concept is still all about someone wanting to come back from the dead and take his place as a beloved warrior and leader. 

There's an opening sequence that explains who the new villain is this time around, the titular Dragon Emperor (played by Jet Li), and then it's time to catch up with the O'Connells once again. Rick is sort of content, but also kind of bored, while Evelyn (Maria Bello replacing Rachel Weisz in the role) seems to be just fine about a life where she's not being put in mortal danger every so often. Or maybe she's just better at keeping up a pretence. Young Alex (Luke Ford) is now old enough to be gallivanting about on his own adventures, which is why he is in Shanghai, as is his uncle, Jonathan (John Hannah). The whole O'Connell family soon ends up in Shanghai, and they end up having to work hard to stop the resurrected Emperor from becoming immortal.

Fraser, Li, Bello, Hannah, Michelle Yeoh, and Isabella Leong, and even Liam Cunningham, all do pretty good here, in relation to the script that they have to work with. It's a messy film that wants to recapture the spectacle of the previous movies without slavishly repeating any of the set-pieces, but it ends up falling flat. I'll put a small part of the blame for that on Ford, playing the youngest of the O'Connell clan. Whether it's a weak script that he can't overcome or just his own inability to emanate any sense of real charisma, Ford is the least of the cast members onscreen here, and that is a problem exacerbated by the way in which his character is foisted upon us as if he could somehow become a natural successor to Fraser's character. I'm maybe being a bit unfair to Ford here. He's certainly not terrible, but he cannot overcome the failings of the script in the same way that everyone else can, because we already know, and already like, most of the other main players.

Gough and Millar obviously wanted to work with a certain structure, but also wanted to keep things at a certain distance from the previous two movies. They want to deliver a nice, comforting, helping of filmic fun that is the same . . . but different. Unfortunately, they completely forget to add the actual fun. Even the fact that the villain doesn't really have any seriously misguided motive for his actions, other than his selfishness, brings everything down a notch. You don't watch this movie for the script, or direction. You watch it to enjoy some of the stars, mainly Li and an underused Yeoh.

Cohen can be a dependable pair of hands for this sort of thing, but he doesn't seem to have any enthusiasm for this story. The plotting has a number of predictable moments you have to trudge through, the set-pieces have their entertainment factor hidden by horrible CGI and cack-handed editing, and any amusing calbacks to past events in the movie series just make you wish that you'd spent your time revisiting the previous films.

It’s a shame that this ended up being the end of this series (although there are a good number of separate The Scorpion King movies by now) because it almost turns the entire trilogy into a warning to others, perfectly illustrating the standard law of diminishing returns for this kind of stuff. I hope to never watch this again, but the completist in me is happy enough that I finally marked it off the list.

4/10

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The Fast And The Furious (2001)

Point Break with flashy car races - that's all The Fast And The Furious is, but that's all it needs to be. It's a lot of brainless fun with a lot of very good looking cars on screen for most of its duration. There's also a lot of turn of the century CGI working to make the speedy sequences seem speedier and the car engine parts sometimes visible when drivers push the button for an essential NOS boost.

Paul Walker plays Brian, an undercover cop trying to get into the street racing circuit to find out just who is responsible for a number of daring heists on moving trucks (trucks that are moving, not trucks being used by removal companies). The prime suspect is Dominic Toretto, played by Vin Diesel, who is the centre of the street racing scene and the man that most of the main players look up to. But Brian gets close, too close. He likes Dom's sister, Mia (Jordana Brewster), and gets to like Dom as he gets closer to cracking the case.

Rob Cohen directs with aptitude and certainly knows that, whenever possible, the car is the star here. The script, written by Gary Scott Thompson, Erik Bergquist, and David Ayer, is full of nonsense that builds into a creed these racers live by, but it gets the plot from A to B to Z, and has occasional moments of wit in there.

The cast all do what they have to. Paul Walker is likeable enough in the main role, Vin Diesel is a big man who growls a lot, Jordana Brewster looks pretty, Michelle Rodriguez does that scowl-gurn thing as the tough woman once again. There's also Rick Yune, Chad Lindberg, the great Ted Levine, Ja Rule, Noel Gugliemi (you may not recognise the name, but you'll know his face) and Matt Schulze (playing a douchebag who also happens to be the one person that is right about the character played by Walker).

Unsurprisingly, the soundtrack features a mix of loud rock and dance/hip-hop tunes with a strong bassline. It's what you'd expect for a movie about cars with stereo systems that cost more than most people's first runaround. What is surprising is how bad some of the processed shots are with some of the driving scenes akin to something from the 1950s. But, of course, you're not supposed to be looking out of the windows, you're supposed to be looking at the attractive stars and their attractive cars.

It's good fun, there are some enjoyable race sequences and good stuntwork on display, and, as I'm not a "gearhead", I'd say you can add an extra point if you're REALLY into cars. The best is yet to come though, and this should be viewed as the starting point for a franchise that would go from strength to strength (even the weaker instalments don't stop it from easily being the best movie series built around Vin Diesel).

7/10

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The Hurricane Heist (2018)

The Hurricane Heist is quite terrible. The characterisations are laughably bad, every scene is overloaded with CGI, and there are moments in which it's very difficult to remember just what the hell is going on, thanks to the choppy editing and fast and loose nature of the screenplay.

Toby Kebbell and Ryan Kwanten play two brothers, Will and Breeze Rutledge, respectively. At the very start of the movie we see the younger versions of their characters in the middle of a super-strong hurricane that kills their father. This has led to Will becoming a meteorologist and Breeze being at a bit of a loss after his time in the military. One of his recent jobs involved working on a generator in a treasury facility that has the task of shredding millions and millions of dollars. When very bad weather causes generator problems, a Treasury agent named Casey (Maggie Grace) calls on Breeze to take him to the facility and help fix things, not realising that while she is out of the picture the place is being taken over by robbers. The weather keeps getting worse, but Casey is with the right people to help her use the conditions to foil the robbers.

Directed by Rob Cohen, who has a few other titles in his filmography in the same vein as this slice of silliness, The Hurricane Heist is the kind of entertainment that you put on when you don't want to think too much. It has spectacle and decent pacing, although anyone after stuff like decent characters, logic, and surprises should look elsewhere.

The script, by Jeff Dixon and Scott Windhauser, is the big weakness. Revelations and character developments are awkwardly shoehorned in between action sequences when the best approach would surely have been to take a bit more time during the opening act to set everyone up before then leaving them to battle robbers and insanely strong wind and rain.

Kebbell and Kwanten may not want to put this film on any highlight reel but at least both know exactly what movie they're in, and they have fun in their roles (with Kebbell involved in a couple of the more enjoyable set-pieces). In fact, everyone at least plays their part well enough, with Grace also doing a decent job as the agent facing overwhelming odds as she tries to foil the robbery, and Ralph Ineson as another agent mixed up in the whole mess. Nobody else really makes much of an impression but that doesn't really matter, as they're mostly there to be a threat to our leads while the hurricane continues to build and build into an even bigger threat.

Not the worst film of last year, not by a long shot, but enjoying this movie is only possible if you know exactly what you're letting yourself in for. It's definitely not as good as it could be, and the first few set-pieces show how good it could have been (I was impressed by both the car chase sequence and the later moments showing Kebbell using the strong wind to his advantage as he threw stuff around a corner to be blown into the baddies), but it's an easy, disposable, watch.

6/10

You can buy the movie here.
Americans can buy it here.

xXx (2002)

Do you ever think you're cool? Have you ever played skateboard or snowboard games on a console and imagined living that lifestyle? Ever had daydreams that have you helping to save the world while also sticking it to the man?

Well just stop. You're not cool. Even if you're sometimes a little bit cool, by accident or design, then you need to remember that you'll never be as cool as Xander Cage, the cooler-than-cool main character in xXx.

Cage (Vin Diesel) is a man who spends his time performing EXTREME stunts that make him quite the rock star to his many fans. But it also gets him noticed by Agent Augustus Gibbons (Samuel L. Jackson), a man trying to convince his colleagues at the NSA that they need to start using a new type of secret agent for new types of criminals. And that's how Cage ends up dropped into another country and directed to get information on a major villain named Yorgi (Marton Csokas), which may give him an excuse to drive fast cars, pose in mid-air during jumps on a motorbike, skate down rails on a silver tray as he avoids sniper bullets, paraglide around, and cause an avalanche to give him an upper hand while he snowboards towards a big group of henchmen.

All of the above happens in xXx and I don't think listing them here would count as anything spoilery. This is a film made up of scenes built around moments they sold in the trailer. Well, those scenes and Vin Diesel's gravelly voice and attitude.

Writer Rich Wilkes seems to throw in everything that might work for the cool kids in the 21st century, and it works better than it should because of the way in which it's the whole lifestyle of the main character.

Director Rob Cohen handles the material competently enough. The most fun is to be had in the first third - a "training exercise" before the main mission - but the 2-hour runtime never drags, thanks to the spacing of the set-pieces and the mounting ridiculousness as everyone involved wants to prove how much they can deliver the goods while being a deliberate anti-Bond. If something can explode then it can explode BIG, if the soundtrack can fit a bit of nu-metal into a scene then it will (not enough to be grating, but it keeps popping up), and everything revolves around the fact that Vin Diesel is the smartest, strongest man for the job.

Diesel does well enough in his role, with a lot of thanks due to the stunt team here too (sadly, one of the main stunt players, Harry O'Connor, died - a sobering reminder of the efforts made by the people we so often don't see acknowledged enough), Csokas is enjoyable enough as the generic baddie with an accent, Jackson does his thing, and Asia Argento catches Diesel's eye and gets to act tough before the script lets her down by making her little more than a wide-eyed female onlooker during the main stunts that occur during the grand finale.

It's not a film that transforms the action genre but it's one that tries hard throughout most of the main sequences to entertain and provide something not already seen a hundred times before. While not entirely successful, and some of the moments clang like a dropped anvil, it's a fun slice of dumb.

6/10.

Get yourself a double-bill here.
Americans can get a nice disc here.

The Skulls (2000)

This teen thriller about a powerful secret society hidden within the walls of a top Ivy League institution is a lot of fun despite (or perhaps because of) the fact that it starts off being quite unbelievable and just gets more and more implausible with each scene.

Joshua Jackson is the young lad with no family fortune who finds himself lucky enough to be joining “The Skulls”. His friends, played by Leslie Bibb and Hill Harper, don’t view this as a good thing. “If it's secret and elite, it can't be good”.

There is one fellow being initiated at the same time (played by Paul Walker) who thinks it is a good thing indeed . . . . . . . . until something goes a bit wrong and it starts to become clear just how far-reaching and powerful this secret society really is.

Written by John Pogue, and directed by Rob Cohen, The Skulls has a decent cast and lively pacing to carry an audience through the preposterousness from start to finish. This is a secret society that has a large symbol stuck on top of a main building. It’s a secret society easier to infiltrate and mess with than Wikipedia entries. For goodness sake, its members are BRANDED. But part of the fun to be had from this movie is derived from laughing at those involved. The film may want to sell itself as some sleek teen thriller but, really, it also points and laughs at those who will go to ridiculous lengths just to join some exclusive club that will have them as a member.

Joshua Jackson, Leslie Bibb, Paul Walker and Hill Harper are all good enough in their respective roles but the real treat for film fans comes from having support from Craig T. Nelson (brilliant as the ruthlessly ambitious father of Paul Walker’s character), William Petersen and Christopher McDonald. Steve Harris is also excellent as Detective Sparrow.

Nothing to seek out and see immediately, The Skulls would fit the bill if you were stuck indoors on a rainy evening and it came on TV. Arguably more entertaining for all the wrong reasons than for all the right ones, it’s still entertaining.
 
6/10 

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