Category: Directors Kr

To Be Takei (2014, Jennifer M. Kroot)

To Be Takei is unexpected, even though everything it presents about its subject’s life is somewhere between common knowledge and readily accessible knowledge. Even though director Kroot opens the film on a jovial note–George Takei (the titular Takei) and his husband, Brad Takei (sort of also the titular Takei), taking their morning walk and bickering about whether they’re walking faster for the benefit of the camera–Takei is serious. Kroot has a lot of fun, but her thesis is it’s serious.

Of course, she also opens the film with Howard Stern introducing it, so she has to work uphill to get to serious. And George Takei’s life certainly has a lot of serious in it. Kroot often saves clips (and discussions) of William Shatner for when she needs to relieve some of the stress in the film.

The film does have a somewhat set narrative; it tracks Takei as he opens his first musical, based on his experiences in internment camps. Along the way, Kroot covers everything else Takei’s famous for–“Star Trek”, Facebook, being gay. The Facebook stuff is almost an aside, ditto the “Star Trek” stuff. Takei’s experiences–both as a gay man in the mid-to-late twentieth century and in Hollywood at that time–are exceptional. Kroot never draws attention it, but Takei’s life is uncommon on almost every level. Except maybe the bickering married stuff.

To Be Takei is surprisingly good. Sure, the protagonists are engaging, but Kroot’s presentation and conclusions make it work.

Taxi 3 (2003, Gérard Krawczyk)

Taxi 3 starts with a superior set-up, a James Bond-esque chase scene through Marseilles, the good guy on a bicycle, running from the bad guys (on rollerblades). It’s goofy and funny–the best part being the bad guy running into a plexiglass (being carried on the street, a riff on the standard glass) and bouncing off it. It’s nothing spectacular, but it seems to show Taxi 3 is at least going to keep with the rest of the series in terms of diverting attention. Then the good guy reveals himself–and it’s Sylvester Stallone and Taxi 3 all of a sudden skyrockets in potential. After the intro’s done, there’s a beautiful Bond opening title riff. It seems like it’s going to be superior.

And then it all comes crashing down. Given the series always seems like Luc Besson writes the scripts on napkins at breakfast–a ninety minute diversion, some laughs and impressive driving, solid performances–it’d be hard for it to be a complete failure. But with such a strong opening, Taxi 3 sets itself up for a fall.

The script is at fault. The dialogue’s fine, but the plot’s lame. Besson’s greatest influence for these movies seems to be Beverly Hills Cop II (the emphasis on the villains elaborate and illogical heists) and this one’s no different. Klutzy cop Frédéric Diefenthal is after a gang who dresses up like Santa Claus–the story’s set at Christmas, which initially seemed like it would provide some good material, but it doesn’t. He’s so obsessed with the case–in the film’s weakest joke–he can’t tell girlfriend Emma Wiklund is eight months pregnant. Besson’s reasonably adept at finding comic moments for these characters, but that revelation scene is painfully unfunny. Samy Naceri finds out girlfriend Marion Cotillard is similarly with child (though she’s only just found out herself). Besson handles that situation far better, with an amusing driving scene where Naceri can’t pay attention to the road in order to monitor Cotillard’s condition.

It seems like Besson needed to accommodate Wiklund’s actual pregnancy and just figured setting up Cotillard would give him something for Diefenthal and Naceri to talk about in their handful of scenes together. They meet up around the halfway point, when Diefenthal drags Naceri into the plot. It’s forced and awkward, like it’s impossible to imagine the two hanging out when there isn’t a movie going on.

Besson uses Bai Ling as the main villain, which is stupid and predictable. She’s not bad, but she’s annoying.

Bernard Farcy is funny as Diefenthal’s moronic boss. Edouard Montoute is a solid police sidekick to Diefenthal and gets some of the edgier material. Apparently, black cops in Marseilles get run over all the time….

Krawczyk’s direction is decent, certainly suggestive of greater potential than Taxi sequels.

At the end, it picks up a little, since there is a twenty minute chase sequence (earlier, there’s a long and boring one, played for laughs, which definitely hurts the film). It’s a mildly diverting ninety minutes… which is the point. But the opening certainly suggests it could have been more.

Maybe I’m just upset Stallone never showed up again.

Taxi 2 (2000, Gérard Krawczyk)

Taxi 2 is a sequel in the least artistic, but possibly most admirable way. It picks up an indeterminate time after the first movie, doesn’t deal with the first movie’s conclusion (Samy Naceri becoming a race car driver), and doesn’t really have a story. Instead, it opens with a car chase, then some humor, then throws Naceri into an awkward dinner with girlfriend Marion Cotillard’s parents. It plays more like a reunion than a sequel (or continuation).

Luc Besson’s script takes place over a day and a half, with the half taking place mostly in the third act, so it’s all very fast. Once Naceri and Frédéric Diefenthal are reunited, Taxi 2 just goes. Besson fills the movie with references to the first (a pizza delivery guy, Diefenthal’s driving instructor), but also mimics it. Cotillard has even less to do in this one than the first, just waiting around for Naceri to show up. It wastes her, but given the movie’s practically a slapstick comedy… it doesn’t seem like it would have ever used her well.

Because the present action is long stretches of real-time, whether car chases or action sequences, and it only runs eighty-eight minutes, Naceri doesn’t run away with the movie like he did the first. Besson’s plot is overflowing, this time with a lot of cheap–but funny–laughs, like Diefenthal ending up in the trash again and again. There’s also Bernard Farcy’s bigoted police commissioner–and this time, the Japanese government is visiting, so he’s got a lot of great scenes. But Besson actually throws in a dog poop joke. It makes no sense (the dog poop is on the middle of an airport runway), but it’s absurdly dumb enough to be funny.

Actually, absurdly dumb and funny describes Taxi 2 well–Naceri’s taxi has wings this time and there’s a parachuting scene and a wonderful pile-up of police cars. Director Gérard Krawczyk does a mediocre action director job here, though he handles the humor rather well. His car chases, besides the beautiful Parisian backdrop, lack much excitement. Competent, but not compelling.

Inexplicably, I think the movie uses one of the familiar themes from one of Tarantino’s firsts. I can’t remember which film, but it certainly is recognizable and it seems odd. I mean, Besson’s been around longer than Tarantino. The music worked well, I guess.

It’s a fine enough time killer, with the ending even amusing enough to suggest it’s a better movie.

1/4★

CREDITS

Directed by Gérard Krawczyk; written by Luc Besson; director of photography, Gérard Sterin; edited by Thierry Hoss; music by Al Khemya; production designer, Jean-Jacques Gernolle; produced by Besson, Laurent Pétin and Michèle Pétin; released by ARP Sélection.

Starring Samy Naceri (Daniel Morales), Frédéric Diefenthal (Émilien Coutant-Kerbalec), Marion Cotillard (Lilly Bertineau), Emma Sjöberg (Petra), Bernard Farcy (Commissaire Gibert), Jean-Christophe Bouvet (Général Edmond Bertineau), Frédérique Tirmont (Lilly’s Mother) and Shimizu Tsuyu (Yuli).

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