THE DEAD POOL: You Ain’t Gonna Be On “News at Eleven”

The Dead Pool (1988) – Directed by Buddy Van Horn – Starring Clint Eastwood, Patricia Clarkson, Liam Neeson, Evan C. Kim, David Hunt, and Jim Carrey.

There is nothing wrong with THE DEAD POOL, but there isn’t a lot here to get excited about, either.

THE DEAD POOL does have a special place in my cinematic heart, however, as it’s the first Dirty Harry movie I ever watched. When I was a kid and came across the movie on HBO or TNT or wherever, it was my first experience with Callahan and I dug this film about an older, grumpy cop who hated the press and hated the suspects, and could both blow someone away with his gun and outhink the mobster who put a hit out on him.

Watching it now and seeing it in the context of the other Dirty Harry films, THE DEAD POOL comes across as a perfectly harmless film that I can watch or not watch. It’s not the kind of movie that excites any kind of real reaction in me, except for a few points.

First, I love the idea that Callahan has started to gain a bit of fame in San Francisco. It’s only natural that a guy involved in this many cases has caught the attention of the local media, so it makes narrative sense that after yet another famous case (Callahan’s testimony has helped to put away a mob boss) the media wants to talk to him and the now PR-savvy San Francisco Police Department wants him to be more press friendly. It’s a far more interesting way to make Callahan feel isolated than to introduce more senior officers to yell at him.

Second, Eastwood was 58 when THE DEAD POOL was made and he’s obviously a bit slower than he used to be, but he does a pretty good job making Callahan look tired of the job and not because of age. There are multiple times in this movie when I can see and hear Danny Glover shaking his head and grumbling, “I’m getting too old for this sh*t.” Callahan won’t say it, but he will threaten to retire when his superiors push the PR angle at him too hard.

Third, there’s the remote control car chase. It’s one of those sequences that most people will either love or hate. When I was a kid, I thought it was the coolest thing ever. Now, it feels a bit out of place in a Dirty Harry movie, but then, Callahan being out of place in an ever-changing world has long been part of the franchise, so even though I don’t really like it, I see the logic behind it, which in turn makes me like it, again.

Sometimes, I over-think things.

THE DEAD POOL has gained some traction over the years for the inclusion of two of its actors: Liam Neeson and Jim (credited as James) Carrey. Carrey’s role is to be the first murder victim. He lip-syncs (poorly) to Guns N Roses’ “Welcome to the Jungle,” argues with Neeson, and then ODs on drugs when our murder jams it down his throat. It’s not really fair to Carrey to praise or lambaste his performance since it’s so small. As for Neeson, he plays the horror director Peter Swan, the prime suspect of the murders thanks to his involvement in the Dead Pool contest.

What is the Dead Pool? It’s one of those games that’s both horrible and awesome to play – if you’re 15. It’s like fantasy baseball, except instead of figuring out who’s going to hit the most doubles, you select a team of celebrities who are going to die. When someone on your list dies, you get a point.

There’s a muted relationship angle here with Callahan and Samantha Walker (Patricia Clarkson), a news reporter who he clashes heads with, but also takes to dinner. It’s not a very strong part of the film, but it’s not horrible, either. It’s just sort of there, much like the murder investigation is just sort of there. THE DEAD POOL really just exists so we can see Callahan one more time. For that, I’m thankful, but while I’ll watch it, I’m not going out of my way to do so.

THE MASK: Hold On To Your Lugnuts

The Mask (1994) – Directed by Chuck Russell – Starring Jim Carrey, Cameron Diaz, Peter Riegert, Peter Greene, Amy Yasbeck, Richard Jeni, and Ben Stein.

I have a hard time judging comedies, and I don’t think I’m alone on this. Whenever you see those “Top 100 Movies of All-Time” lists, the few comedies that are included tend to be ancient comedies, made closer to the invention of motion pictures than anything currently playing at the multiplex. Part of it for me, though, is that I stop finding movies funny rather quickly – I can remember seeing There’s Something About Mary in the theaters and laughing from start-to-finish. The last time I watched it, I barely chuckled.

I mention all of this because it applies directly to THE MASK, the second film (after Ace Ventura) in the rise of Jim Carrey. I remember seeing the film in the theater and laughing a bunch of times and just generally thinking it was pretty great, but when I watched it for the first time in years last night, I don’t think I did more than smile a few times.

Comedies thus get judged in two different ways: the first watch and then every other watch. For me to like a comedy the first time, simply making me laugh is enough, but after I’ve seen your jokes and laughed at your pratfalls, I need to be able to actually like the characters and the story. It’s why I hold a comedy like Forgetting Sarah Marshall in higher regard than There’s Something About Mary. The latter made me laugh much, much harder that first time out, but the former is a much better story, with more interesting characters, and even if the humor will always be less bombastic, the ability of the story to trump that keeps me interested. It’s why I think Bill Murray is the greatest comedic actor of all time – the guy isn’t just funny (no one has better timing), he’s a genuinely great actor.

I was worried about what my reaction to THE MASK was going to be. As much as I liked it then, I’ve long since cooled on Jim Carrey’s comedic act. I’m much more interested in watching him in movies where he acts as opposed to movies where he has to be funny, especially if that funny involves exactly the kind of exaggerated physical humor that THE MASK relies on.

The bad news is that, as I mentioned, I only chuckled a few times. The good news is that after a rocky start, THE MASK turns into a compelling movie. While much of Carrey’s, “Ssssssssssmoking!” act has not aged well, the overtly cartoonish nature of the Mask character (he’s clearly a Tex Avery character come to life) is balanced nicely by the milquetoast quality of Stanley Ipkiss. The narrative is simple and concise, and Carrey is supported by solid acting from Peter Riegert, Cameron Diaz, and Richard Jeni.

Like many superhero stories, THE MASK is a story of an ordinary guy given an extraordinary gift, but unlike most superhero stories, THE MASK is both a comedy and not really all that superheroic. The mask itself is a piece of green wood that when attached to a user brings out a bit of their wild side. For Stanley, this quiet, woman-shy guy becomes a green-faced mix of Tex Avery cartoons and Cab Calloway. He becomes the aggressor instead of the stepped upon, and the Mask strips him on any real sense of morality.

It makes for a fascinating watch, and it imbues all of the action in this story with a real darkness. Yeah, it’s funny that mechanics step on Stanley, so the Mask goes back and steps on them, and the emphasis is on the joke of the Mask showing up and yelling, “Hold on to your lugnuts!,” but that doesn’t change the fact that the Mask shoving a tailpipe up each of their respective buttholes is more than a bit sadistic.

The special effects still hold up exceedingly well. It’s pretty impressive that THE MASK was made for $28 million and still looks this amazingly good. I love the outlandish use of color, the film’s willingness to break out in a musical numbers, and just the sheer fun of the film. It’s not a great movie, but it is a fun one.

While Carrey rightly gets the lion’s share of the credit for the film, there are other fine performances here, too, that help to ground the film. THE MASK was Cameron Diaz’s big break and she’s fantastic. I remember watching the film when it was released and wanting to see more of her (and not just because she’s attractive), and was genuinely, pleasantly surprised when she started appearing in other movies.

The real secondary star of THE MASK, however is Peter Riegert, who plays a cop investigating the Mask’s activities. He delivers a wonderfully deadpanned performance, adding his own dry sense of humor that grounds all the zaniness around him.

Well, I should say that the real, real secondary star of THE MASK is Stanley’s dog Milo, who’s clearly the smartest person in the whole movie. He’s loyal and cute, and clever enough that after Stanley tells him to stay in the car with a handcuffed Riegert, Milo unlocks the car door, opens it, and heads inside the nightclub to help Stanley. He ends up getting to wear the Mask, too, for a bit, and it’s still the funniest scene in the movie.

THE MASK does a really nice job of mixing up the humor with enough pathos to keep the film grounded. It’s a fun movie, and one of the best examples of seeing a live-action cartoon. I don’t like the movie as much as I once did but it’s still a good movie. It’s really quite amazing they never made a real sequel to the film (just the Jamie Kennedy cash and grab), but maybe that’s for the best. The Mask can be worn by anyone and so the story can move in all sorts of directions, but it takes a unique talent like Carrey to make it work. Other comedians could do it, but they’d be very different films, and one wonders if audiences would take to seeing someone new strap on the Mask for an adventure.

In the bonus features, someone involved in the production makes the point that the original ending was having Richard Jeni’s character jump into the water after Carrey and Diaz discard it, but that it didn’t test well with audiences, so they shot a new ending with the dog retrieving it. And now, almost 20 years on, we’re probably closer to seeing a MASK reboot than we are to seeing a relaunch.

DISNEY’S A CHRISTMAS CAROL: The Ghost of Animated Christmas Performance Capture

Disney’s A Christmas Carol (2009) – Directed by Robert Zemeckis – Starring Jim Carrey, Gary Oldman, Cary Elwes, Sammi Hanratty, Colin Firth, Bob Hoskins, Robin Wright Penn, Ryan Ochoa, and Molly C. Quinn.

When I watched Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol the other night and wasn’t remotely moved by it, I began to wonder if maybe I’d hit my limit on adaptations of Charles Dickens’ classic. Combine this with my general dislike of Jim Carrey and my general dislike of performance capture and my hopes weren’t too high for DISNEY’S A CHRISTMAS CAROL adaptation to win me over. In fact, I only watched it because Netflix had it streaming and I wanted something playing in the background while I wrote the review for Love Actually.

It was to my incredible surprise that by the time Jacob Marley (Gary Oldman) had threatened and warned Ebeneezer Scrooge (Jim Carrey) about what his future held for him I was totally engrossed in the film, and by the time it ended I was willing to rank DISNEY’S A CHRISTMAS CAROL among my favorite adaptations of Dickens’ tale.

This is a prime example of why I like doing these themed months; without spending the month purposely looking for holiday films to watch I wouldn’t bother with a film starring Jim Carrey and made with performance capture, especially when there are other versions of this story that I wanted to see more. (Like Scrooged. How I managed to go all this time without seeing Scrooged is beyond me, but it’s an oversight that’s since been corrected. Expect it to be the next film reviewed.) But because I’m on the lookout for holiday movies this month and because it was streaming on Netflix I’ve found a great film to add to the holiday rotation. DISNEY’S adaptation strikes the perfect balance between being a kid’s movie and an adult’s movie, and Robert Zemeckis has wrung seemingly every bit of humor, fright, and action possible out of this story.

But did it have to be performance capture?

Performance capture is just generally pretty creepy-looking. I enjoyed Zemeckis’ previous movies made with this technique (The Polar Express, Beowulf), but my enjoyment was in spite of the performance capture and not enhanced by it. After seeing several movies made with this technique now, I still have to wonder … why? It’s not as good as live-action, it’s not as good as hand-drawn animation, and it’s not as good as CGI. It just looks … off. If the movie is good I’ll suffer through it, but it’s usually not a pleasant watch.

It’s to Zemeckis’ credit that A CHRISTMAS CAROL is the best performance capture I’ve seen; it looks good enough that I actually didn’t mind watching most of it. I’m not sure why most of the actors play multiple roles (Carrey is not only Scrooge, but all of the Ghosts of Christmas; Oldman is Bob Cratchit, Jacob Marley, and Tiny Tim) except maybe to save some cash for the studio, but it can be a bit disconcerting to see vaguely familiar faces popping up on multiple bodies.

What helps keep things righted, however, is that Zemeckis just might have done the best job in any Christmas Carol adaptation of making London look interesting.

Because honestly, mid-nineteenth century London normally looks like a wet fart – stinky, soggy, and brown.

That’s nothing against the city, but a city that big from that era was awash in greys, browns, and blacks. When you combine that with the general dreary tone of the story, there’s not a lot of room for color in A Christmas Carol, but Zemeckis has done a masterful job of infusing Scrooge’s adventure with a real vibrancy. This adaptation moves, and it moves in loads of color. London is still the same drab, dreary place it always is, but Zemeckis has infused every possible aspect of the story that he can with color and movement.

Zemeckis wisely builds off the cold, muted, dull colors of London by filling out the palette with the Ghosts. As the film progresses, Zemeckis brings more and more color into the film as the action picks up. The Ghost of Christmas Past, for instance, is a flickering, white candle person, while the Ghost of Christmas Present is a big, fat redhead. The first is wispy and quiet while the second is rotund and loud. By the time we get to the Ghost of Christmas Future, Zemeckis slams the palette all the way back down with the midnight black ghost and his nightmarish horses.

There’s plenty of action, too. I absolutely love the way the film treats the ghostly visions, with Scrooge’s contemporary environment often dissolving to reveal the vision. The best example of this comes with the Ghost of Christmas Present as the floor of their ornate room dissolves to reveal the city of London. The room goes swooping over the city, giving us a wonderful and rich vision of the bright, warm room and the harsh, cold city. As creepy as the human characters can be to look at, the environments look amazing.

As for the story itself, it’s A Christmas Carol, and importantly, Zemeckis keeps Carrey contained inside his characters. Maybe Carrey’s at a point in his career where he just can’t go crazy for the entire shoot, or maybe the performance capture process forces him to play roles rather than allowing his roles to become a Carrey caricature. Whatever the case, he’s rarely been better than he is as Scrooge. He’s so good you rarely notice it’s him, whereas the Past and Present Ghosts see Carrey’s features shine through. I like how Zemeckis decides to have Scrooge spend Christmas dinner with his nephew, even if the performance capture version of Colin Firth is creepy to look at.

And that’s what it really comes down to with DISNEY’S A CHRISTMAS CAROL – it’s a really good adaptation that is, at times, really creepy to look at. It’s a bit disconcerting to see Carrey’s and Oldman’s image shining through so many characters, but the story is really well told, and it’s perfectly paced. Even with the creepiness of performance capture, this is a gorgeous film to watch and completely engaging from start to finish.

Be sure to check out the Holiday Review Index for all the Holiday-themed reviews to be found at Atomic Anxiety.