Jupiter Ascending

For F*** Magazine

JUPITER ASCENDING 

Director : Andy Wachowski, Lana Wachowski
Cast : Mila Kunis, Channing Tatum, Eddie Redmayne, Douglas Booth, Tuppence Middleton, Sean Bean
Genre : Sci-Fi/Action/Fantasy
Opens : 5 February 2015

It seems that The Wachowskis enjoyed working on the futuristic “An Orison of Sonmi~451” section of Cloud Atlas, because with Jupiter Ascending, Lana and Andy go full-on sci-fi space opera. The title refers not only to the planet but also to the character Jupiter Jones (Kunis). The daughter of an astronomer and a Russian immigrant, Jones lives with her mother’s extended family and works as a maid, scrubbing toilets for rich families. Interplanetary warrior Caine Wise (Tatum) arrives on earth to guide and protect Jupiter, who is in reality the reincarnation of the queen of the universe. The queen’s three children, Balem (Redmayne), Titus (Booth) and Kalique (Middleton) Abrasax, are vying for inheritance of the planet earth, Jupiter’s emergence throwing a spanner in the works. Breaking free of her mundane existence, Jupiter comes face to face with her larger-than-life future among the stars.

            A friend of this reviewer remarked that she thought Jupiter Ascending was an adaptation of a young adult novel, and it’s not hard to see why. The Wachowskis follow the “chosen girl” template to the letter, with the Mary Sue trope of an ordinary girl who discovers her extraordinary destiny in full effect. The foremost example of the space opera subgenre in film is the Star Wars saga – unfortunately, Jupiter Ascending has more in common with the prequel trilogy than the original three films. The Star Wars prequels were preoccupied with political nitty-gritties that didn’t exactly make for very thrilling storytelling. There, it was trade negotiations, here, it’s a dynasty-run corporation. A good portion of this film is Mila Kunis about to sign contracts. With the three siblings jostling for control of an intergalactic corporate empire, this is Dallas in outer space.

            While the story isn’t the greatest, the milieu in which it takes place is quite impressive. This is a visual feast and everywhere one looks in Jupiter Ascending, care and effort is evident. From the production design by Hugh Bateup to the costume design by Kym Barrett to the visual effects work supervised by Dan Glass, this does not feel like hastily slapped-together sci-fi schlock. Sure, the visual ideas may not be earth-shatteringly unique, but this is the kind of film in which every little prop feels like a work of art. When there are low budget productions out there painting NERF guns black and hoping the audience doesn’t notice, that is worth something. A scene in which Caine swoops between skyscrapers on anti-gravity boots makes far better use of the Chicago skyline as an action sequence environment than the Transformers movies ever did. One of the locales is a city inside the storm of the planet Jupiter’s red spot. There is the feeling that there is a rich mythology and the potential for an engrossing universe somewhere waiting to be built upon that this particular story doesn’t tap into.

            There is an effort made to have Jupiter Jones be at least a little more than the tabula rasa protagonists of her type often are – Mila Kunis is sufficiently charming in the role and finds the right balance for the character such that she doesn’t come off as wholly annoying. We also get to see her relatives, their squabbles juxtaposed against the grand intergalactic family dispute. Points there, seeing as it would be easier to go the “conveniently an orphan” route. That said, it is still difficult to buy Jupiter as little more than a plot device.

            Caine is also very much a stock character – stoic, tough, not necessarily a romantic guy. We stand by the opinion that Channing Tatum’s true calling is comedy and he’s not the greatest at the straight-up man of action thing, but he does give it a good attempt here. He does look slightly goofy playing a space warrior spliced with wolf DNA and, naturally, he goes shirtless for a portion of the film. Going off Eddie Redmayne’s performance here alone, it’s hard to believe that he is an Oscar nominee. As the supercilious aristocratic villain, Redmayne opts for a hoarse, mumbling line delivery and his outbursts aren’t as hammily entertaining as this reviewer was hoping for. Douglas Booth’s Titus is preening and vain; these just aren’t very original interpretations for characters of this type. Sean Bean is as reliable as he usually is, but as “the mentor”, it’s another stock character without many dimensions to him.

            When Jupiter Ascending was pushed back from its summer 2014 release date, speculation was rife that it was because of a certain Marvel space opera flick that posed heavy competition and there and then, many made up their minds that the film would be a train-wreck. While there are potentially laughable elements, Jupiter Ascending is middle of the road rather than outright terrible and it is very competently made. The abundance of visual splendour does make up somewhat for the “been there done that”-ness of the plot.

Summary: Jupiter Ascending’s generic, sometimes uninteresting plot is rescued by exciting, meticulously-crafted visuals and fun action sequences.

RATING: 3 out of 5 Stars

Jedd Jong

            

Ted

For F*** Magazine, Singapore

Movie Review                                                                                                                                                      29/8/12

TED

2012

Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Mila Kunis, Seth MacFarlane (voice), Giovanni Ribisi

Directed by: Seth MacFarlane

            Almost everyone has that little piece of childhood they remember bringing everywhere, be it a blanket, a Barbie doll, a G.I. JOE or, of course, a teddy bear. And many of us would have held imaginary intergalactic space battles enacted with action figures or fantasy tea parties with dolls and stuffed animals; entertaining the thought of these inanimate companions coming to life. There have been many films and TV shows about living toys, from the Toy Story franchise to Small Soldiers to the infamous Twilight Zone episode (we won’t spoil which one)– well, Ted runs on the premise of the magical living toy accompanying its owner into adulthood.

                Mark Wahlberg plays John Bennett, something of an outcast among the neighbourhood kids as a child growing up in a Boston suburb. Yearning for a true friend, he wishes on a shooting star for his Christmas present, a teddy bear, to come to life – which it does. The mysterious walking, talking stuffed toy captures the imagination of the world, becoming an overnight celebrity. As the buzz dies down, the bear, christened “Ted” (voice and motion capture performance by MacFarlane), settles into a routine living alongside his best bud John, the two inseparable after 27 years of friendship. As John grows up, so does Ted, the stuffed toy developing a penchant for marijuana and a libido he struggles to keep in check.

                However, Ted’s antics seem to be coming in the way of John’s relationship with his girlfriend of four years Lori (Kunis), who has happily put up with the rambunctious bear but feels that it would be hard for her to live with a guy whose whole life revolves around a stuffed toy. Her sleazy boss Rex (Joel McHale) hits on her relentlessly, wondering why Lori would choose a slacker like John over a wealthy and successful man like himself. Meanwhile, disturbed stalker Donny (Ribisi), who has been obsessed with Ted ever since the stuffed toy hit the big time, is intent on getting a hold of the enchanted bear for his son (Aedin Mincks) - by any means necessary. John must come to grips with living life as a responsible adult while still preserving the memories he formed with Ted, as circumstances push him to get his priorities in order. 

                 Ted is the live-action directorial debut of Seth MacFarlane, the multi-hyphenate behind the successful animated series Family Guy. The film was also co-written and co-produced by MacFarlane in addition to featuring his vocal and motion-capture performances, and has his fingerprints all over it. In the interest of full disclosure, this reviewer must say that he’s not much of a Seth MacFarlane fan – the guy can seem obnoxious and “funnier-than-thou” at times, and has come under fire for alleged plagiarism – indeed, cartoonist Lucas Turnbloom has claimed that Ted liberally rips off his webcomic Imagine THIS. However, even though many of the jokes here are in the same irreverent, pop culture-referencing mould as in Family Guy and its spin-offs, they are very effective. This is a very funny movie, and some of the gags are true gems. The tone is established from the get-go, as the camera flies past the letters of the “Universal Studios” logo and into the globe, zooming in on the little suburb. Patrick Stewart provides a warm, fuzzy, curl-up-by-the-fireplace narration to set the story up – and immediately makes an anti-Semitic remark. Later in the same narration, he makes and out-of-left-field comment about Apache helicopters.

                This is one of those movies where you don’t want to hear too much about the jokes beforehand because some are just too enjoyable to spoil. Of course several gags are straining too hard, but this isn’t blankly “unfunny”, as many often accuse MacFarlane of being. He engineers some situations (with help from some fun celebrity cameos) that are truly ripe for comedy. There’s talk of singer Norah Jones’ sexual encounter with the titular stuffed toy. Flash Gordon and a homosexual Hal Jordan in the same room. A brutal hotel room brawl between John and his beloved bear (it involves broken bottles and Ted appropriating a radio antenna as a whip). We could go on – these scenarios come flying one after the other and it’s quite the ride.

                One problem though is that many of these jokes can seem rather mean-spirited, even if there’s a grain of truth in them. MacFarlane gleefully takes the mickey out of everyone from Justin Bieber to Brandon Routh, from Chris Brown to Lance Armstrong, races and religions of all stripes – and some of it just isn’t all that pleasant. However, the movie is wholly successful in getting its audience to believe that a bear can walk, talk and smoke a bong, just as the Superman movie made us believe a man could fly. A combination of puppets, animatronics and a CGI bear created using MacFarlane’s voice and motion capture work brings Ted to vivid life, all tied together with that distinct New England twang. Ted can eat and drink, get high on narcotics and apparently perform coitus – how all of this is possible is never quite explained, but we go along with the ‘magic’. It’s actually pretty hard not to get emotionally invested in Ted, for all his idiosyncrasies, and it is to the filmmakers’ credit that we wince and cringe when Ted gets “injured” or put in any kind of jeopardy, and never say “wait a minute, that’s not a real thing”.

                Mark Wahlberg and Mila Kunis are a fair bit better here than they were as Max Payne and Mona Sax respectively in the awful Max Payne film, and they gamely overcome the challenge of acting opposite ‘nothing’. Giovanni Ribisi, who was also the antagonist opposite Wahlberg in Contraband, is fantastically creepy as Donny and gives off quite the serial killer vibe. It’s a shame that his subplot gets the short shrift, the bulk of it squeezed breathlessly into the film’s final act. That’s also easily the best part of the film because we get on with the plot – fun as it may be to see John and Ted hang around and go wild, the film does spend too much time setting it all up and not enough on the action proper.

                Ted is surprising in how it worms its way into your heart, how a convincingly-created character allows us to lower our guard and feel free to laugh. If we as audience members cannot suspend our disbelief then it’s all out the window, and some effort has gone into keeping that disbelief safely suspended. It’s unfortunate that the film is sometimes content with a string of gags in place of full focus on the plot, and the sincerity oftentimes get easily lost in the shuffle of bawdy humour and MacFarlane getting a little too much free rein to strut his stuff(ing).

SUMMARY: Ted attempts to blend adult comedy and childhood fantasy and does draw out the laughs, but this is one stuffed toy that could do with a bout in the washing machine and a little patching up here and there.

RATING: 3 out of 5 STARS

Jedd Jong