Black Mirror (2011) s03e01 – Nosedive

If Nosedive is any indication, “Black Mirror” having guest writers isn’t going to help things. Rashida Jones and Michael Schur wrote the teleplay (they’d previously written “Parks and Recreation” together) from a story by “Mirror” creator Charlie Brooker. The episode also kicks off the show’s Netflix run; it had been on Channel 4, but Netflix took it over, hiring movie director Joe Wright to do a profoundly mediocre job.

Bryce Dallas Howard plays the lead, a woman obsessed with her social media score. Too low of a score, and you lose your job, your apartment, your freedom, and your ability to participate in the ratings game. It’s a similar setup to that “Orville” episode, which came out a year later; guess Seth MacFarlane watched “Black Mirror” and figured he could do better.

He’s not wrong, but let’s talk about Nosedive. Howard’s an incredibly likable lead, but it’s a mediocre script and performance. She’s an unlikable narcissist, desperate for approval from strangers, which drives a wedge in her relationship with brother James Norton. Now, “Mirror” is a very British show, except Nosedive’s pretending it’s not. Norton and co-star Alice Eve are British, while Howard and other co-star Cherry Jones are not. Norton and Eve do American accents, and the cars drive on the right side, so… is “Mirror” trying to appeal more globally? Jones and Schur are American sitcom writers, after all.

It’s a long, tedious episode about Howard getting her comeuppance and learning not everything is about what other people think about you. Michaela Coel’s cameo isn’t even good, but she’s got some personality, which the episode otherwise reviles in not delivering. “Mirror”’s rarely good at explaining the context well enough, but Nosedive takes that avoidance to a whole other level.

Jones is good. It’s not worth watching the rest of it, but she’s good.

“Mirror”’s best when it’s got great lead performances. Nosedive gives Howard a spotlight but then doesn’t give her anything to do in it. Except work her way through various sitcom beats.

Nosedive is so lackluster I was even hoping for one of those lousy “Mirror” end credits epilogues just to have something to discuss. I mean, I suppose there’s something to say about the episode’s take on social media, but there’s also not. Jones and Schur don’t even try to have flaccid observations; they just have excruciatingly dull gags.

If the Netflix episodes keep up the unnecessary length, I hope they at least build in nap time.

Jurassic World Dominion (2022, Colin Trevorrow)

It’s not hard to pinpoint what’s wrong with Jurassic World Dominion, the inglorious (hopefully) end of a twenty-nine-year-old franchise. Director Trevorrow does a bad job directing, he and co-writer Emily Carmichael do a bottom-of-the-barrel job with the script, the actors all seem contractually bound and miserable (even the new additions, with one exception), and Michael Giacchino’s musical score is so terrible they should’ve stopped payment on the check. Otherwise, Dominion would be fine. Just needs a better director, an entirely different story and script, and—I don’t know—the music from the original Jurassic Park SEGA Genesis game instead of Giacchino.

The film opens with a news break, which Trevorrow and Carmichael are incapable of writing. Dominion’s what happens when blockbusters don’t even need to hire script doctors so they don’t embarrass themselves. Trevorrow’s only positive quality is his dogged determination in not letting each horrifyingly embarrassing moment of film slow him from reaching the next. Dominion’s third act is nowhere near as bad as it could be, but the first and second acts—all two endless hours of them—are crashing behind it and the debris distracts from the film at least not getting any worse. Except for Giacchino’s music. Giacchino’s music always gets worse, right into the credits.

Jasmine Chiu plays the newscaster. She wouldn’t be believable as a TikToker on “CSI: Sheboygan,” so introducing twenty-nine years of cloned dinosaur backstory is out of the question. Especially since her news report also sets up this movie’s villain—and the only person who seems like he’s having a good time—Campbell Scott. Scott’s playing a character from the first Jurassic Park, but the part’s recast (for good reasons). Now, Scott’s got a lousy part. He’s playing the not-so-smart head of a genetics company; they’re using prehistoric DNA to cure diseases and create monster bugs. The monster bugs are important. If Trevorrow were any good, there’d be a great Godzilla 1985 reference. But he’s not any good. Instead of an on-point Godzilla bug reference, there are desperate Indiana Jones, Star Wars, and Jaws references like Trevorrow’s still sucking up to executive producer Steven Spielberg.

But Trevorrow directs Scott like he’s doing an incompetent, megalomaniac hipster Steve Jobs. It’s a string of terrible decisions and Scott’s willingness to commit to the bit and somehow get through. He’s never good; it’s impossible, with Carmichael and Trevorrow’s lousy script, for anyone to actually be good, but he’s never boring, bored, or defeated.

Everyone else goes through those emotions, though no one more despondently than Chris Pratt. He’s fifth fiddle in his own franchise, but he doesn’t even care. He’s got one good scene, and it’s from Congo. The rest of the time, he looks like he’s trying to disappear, similar to Bryce Dallas Howard.

Laura Dern and Sam Neill work pretty hard to make their parts work. Either Trevorrow didn’t direct them, or he told them to play their characters exactly the same as they did thirty years ago, only Neill doesn’t have the same American accent anymore. It’s a better accent, but it’s a different one. They get some genuinely terrible dialogue but get through all right.

Also back is Jeff Goldblum, who doesn’t get very much to do, even when he’s around. The second half of the movie is about putting the Jurassic World characters together with the Jurassic Park characters to they can fight the Thanosaurus at the end. Goldblum’s around, but it’s like Trevorrow and Carmichael are scared to write him. Goldblum seems ready to work but never gets asked to do any.

Isabella Sermon plays a cloned human who’s supposedly important to the monster bug plot. It’s all nonsense. Sermon’s fine, but fine in the way you’re being nice about a middling child actor. She was in the last movie.

Then BD Wong’s back, of course. He’s shockingly good in a silly role.

New characters this movie—besides Campbell (sort of)—are pilot DeWanda Wise and lackey Mamoudou Athie. The film would be an excellent showcase for both actors if Trevorrow weren’t terrible. But, instead, he flops with both. More with Wise because she’s got more to do—she and Pratt are chemistry-free action buddies. Athie’s just around for various exposition dumps and plot contrivances, but he’s not bad doing them.

Technically, Dominion’s fine. Good CGI. Good photography from John Schwartzman. Not good editing from Mark Sanger, but he’s working from Trevorrow’s footage, set to Giacchino’s music. There’s no way to edit Dominion into a good movie with those quality sinkholes.

Despite teaming up two generations of Jurassic adventurers, Dominion’s a bad, boring, anti-trip down memory lane. Even when Trevorrow’s aping old Park moments, they’re just so desperate they don’t get the nostalgia going; instead, they just further embarrass this entry.

All set to Giacchino’s godawful music, of course.

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018, J.A. Bayona)

After a strong dinosaur suspense opening, with some futuristic submersible entering the closed Jurassic World bay to get something off the seafloor, Fallen Kingdom shockingly quickly becomes a remake of the first Jurassic Park sequel, Lost World. Like, so much you wish there were more in it so David Koepp got a credit through forced arbitration or whatever.

This time, there’s a calamity on the island—a volcano—and Bryce Dallas Howard, now a dinosaur rights activist, wants to get them off the island somehow. Snap of the fingers and in comes Rafe Spall (in for Arliss Howard) who works for rich guy and ret-conned in co-father of dinosaur cloning, James Cromwell. As a British guy. Fallen Kingdom will have some amazing casting finds and choices, but obviously American James Cromwell as a British guy. I wonder if they tried for Sean Connery. Fallen Kingdom is a big Spielberg homage, fifteen or so minutes in to finish. Like, a perfect one; Bayona gets how to do the scenes, gets how to direct the action. And Fallen Kingdom has—unbelievably—a great score from Michael Giacchino. Never thought I’d type those words in that order.

It’s a total rip of John Williams, but a brilliant one. Giacchino doesn’t just lift from Jurassic Park, he lifts from everywhere in Williams’s career, which is very good for Chris Pratt, who’s definitely doing an Indiana Jones audition. The first act reuniting with Howard and Pratt is unsteady; they really needed to have the “relationships based on tense experiences never work” conversation onscreen but don’t. Instead they just turn it all into a joke, which ends up working. Most of the jokes don’t land, but the actors seem a lot more comfortable pretending to be ex-dinosaur amusement park employees than current dinosaur amusement park employees. Fallen Kingdom’s light on establishing the ground situation. It doesn’t ask a lot of questions, it doesn’t encourage many, but it keeps a good pace. The film’s lean and nimble when it needs to be—not easy considering editor Bernat Vilaplana has a concerning lack of timing—which helps it get through the major story shift.

See, Fallen Kingdom’s not a remake of Lost World, it’s not a volcano disaster movie with dinosaurs (though it seems like one for about twelve minutes; may haps a nod to Son of Kong or, dare I say it, People That Time Forgot), it’s actually a haunted mansion movie. The thing haunting the mansion just happens to be a genetically modified raptor. Because the real lead of Fallen Kingdom, at least as far as narrative arcs go (or the implication of them), is Isabella Sermon. She’s Cromwell’s treasured granddaughter and she’s suspicious of Spall because Spall’s a creep caricature. He’s occasionally effective, but not after the first half for sure. Once he teams up with an ill-advised Toby Jones, he just gets more obnoxious. Great comeuppance though, with Bayona digging deep into franchise favorites.

But, yeah, it’s all about Sermon solving the mystery of the basement or whatever. Only the film never does any work to establish it; there’s nothing about Sermon being scared of raptors for some reason or being scared of the gargoyles on the giant scary mad scientist mansion where she lives; there’s not even a sequence establishing she scales the exterior walls of the mansion because she’s a badass kid. She’s in the first scene at the mansion–Kingdom doesn’t bring back the kids from the previous movie, like the original Park did because clearly the filmmakers realized no one liked those kids and instead made a great kid character with Sermon.

Bayona directs that section of the film beautifully. It’s terrifying. Excellent photography from Oscar Faura. And all the rest of it, with the dinosaurs getting to civilization finally–seventeen years after III didn’t deliver it—works out. Bayona and Giacchino make you think you’re watching Spielberg figure out how to do a B-movie dinosaur movie for pure fun.

Acting-wise, Pratt and Howard average out to be fine. He’s usually a little better, she’s usually a little worse—once Sermon teams up with Pratt and Howard, Howard takes a back burner to Pratt being the lovable alpha protector of Sermon, so it’s probably not all Howard’s fault. Spall’s low eh. Justice Smith and Daniella Pineda are both fun as the science nerd sidekicks. Ted Levine’s cruel great white hunter guy is a disappointment; he’s not just no Pete Postlethwaite, he’s not even Peter Stormare.

Good small turn from Geraldine Chaplin, good cameo (though nonsensical) from Jeff Goldblum; pretty much no one else makes an impression. The script’s mercilessly efficient and actually rather impressive in how much it gets done in two hours. And Bayona’s good, Giacchino’s good, the photography’s good, the editing’s not. It’s a surprise once Fallen Kingdom starts getting good, but then it’s not a surprise when it stays good. The film inspires confidence in itself and, potentially, the franchise.

It’s a series of Spielberg action homages strung together with some effective screaming dinosaur mauling victims, with a great John Williams score. What could be better.

Jurassic World (2015, Colin Trevorrow)

If I had to describe a feature of Jurassic World as saddest… I might find myself hard-pressed. There aren’t a lot of possibilities—worst, dumbest, cheapest, silliest, probably some others… but saddest is something different. When the film takes a pointless detour through the original visitor center from Jurassic Park, aged some twenty years and run over with quite a bit of vine growth and so on and I definitely don’t think anyone involved with World has read Alan Weisman’s The World Without Us, which discusses how long it will take for nature to reclaim in layperson’s terms. Though production designer Ed Verreaux’s never impresses. Not when it’s the nostalgia trip, not when it’s the amusement park, not when it’s the control center. Of course, Verreaux can’t help with director Trevorrow’s chronic impatience or wanting composition, just like editor Kevin Stitt can’t do anything about Trevorrow’s utter lack of coverage.

Jurassic World is only occasionally bad-looking—Chris Pratt riding on the motorcycle with the velociraptors has some truly embarrassing composites (John Schwartzman’s photography is middling at best)—but it’s never good looking. Not once. Not even when it’s desperately using the original John Williams music. Though the music’s much better when composer Michael Giacchino is just using the Williams because when Giacchino does it himself? There’s better music on almost every television show. It’s terrible music.

But still not the saddest thing about Jurassic World. The saddest thing about Jurassic World is annoying kids Ty Simpkins and Nick Robinson aren’t ever going to die. They’re visiting aunt Bryce Dallas Howard, who runs the park and works for owner Irrfan Khan, who only partially owns it and an evil shadow corporation really runs it. A slumming Vincent D'Onofrio (I really hope he bought something nice with the paycheck on this one) is the bad company guy. I got off track. Back to Simpkins and Robinson’s narrative immortality.

They’re visiting the park to give their parents (Judy Greer and Andy Buckley) time to work on their divorce, which younger Simpkins has figured out is incoming thanks to Googling their attorneys’ names while Robinson is just concentrating on getting off to college in a couple years. They both give terrible performances, but it’s not their fault. The writing on their fraternal relationship is truly godawful. Trevorrow’s “direction” of the actors is also godawful, but not worse than the script. The script is really rough on Simpkins and Robinson. But it’s still sad they’re never going to die. They spend… a mildly significant portion of the film running from the dinosaurs and they’re never in any danger whatsoever and it’s obvious.

Actually, Jurassic World is always obvious about its victims. Save Katie McGrath’s torturous death sequence, played for laughs because McGrath’s character is supposed to be so terrible (Jurassic World has some issues with how it characterizes its female characters… like a lot of them for a 2015 movie)–that sequence is a vapid, albeit brutal choice from Trevorrow. He makes very few directorial gestures with the film, anything suggesting a pulse stands out a bit. He and editor Stitt take an hour until they can gin up any actual suspense in the film. The third act’s actually pretty solid with it, but the resolution’s so dumb it erases whatever ground the film’s made back up.

The end involves Trevorrow’s attempts at directing Chris Pratt like he’s Harrison Ford or something. It seems more like Ben Affleck playing Harrison Ford only not unlikable like Affleck would play it. Pratt’s not exactly good, but he’s effective and he’s affable. He’s enthusiastic and it successfully impacts his scenes. If Howard’s ever enthusiastic, either the script or Trevorrow’s direction ruins it. Howard’s never fails but she never succeeds. She’d be a good metaphor for Jurassic World if it weren’t so poorly executed, if Simpkins and Robinson weren’t so pointless, if it didn’t always look just a little too cheap. Trevorrow’s got no idea how to show the money onscreen. As a dinosaur movie, it’s completely indifferent to the dinosaurs, which is a bummer.

Lauren Lapkus and Jake Johnson initially seem like they’re going to be good as the control room flunkies who watch everything go to crap when the genetically modified I-Rex gets loose and starts eating dinosaurs and guests, but their arc sputters, then ends badly. Trevorrow mocks Johnson, while extolling Pratt. It’s very weird how manly Pratt’s supposed to be in the film. They should’ve named him Super-Chad.

Though he’s basically got an early nineties Steven Seagal part, which sounds like an amazing movie.

The special effects are fine. Rarely are the dinosaurs around long enough to admire any sort of creative artistry and there are often bad composite lighting messing things up so why bother looking too much.

Omar Sy’s in it so no one can say there’s not a Black guy. Simpkins and Robinson are the most annoying little White boys too. They’re so bland. BD Wong—the only cast member from the original film returning—is awesome. Shame he’s only in it for four minutes max.

Jurassic World’s much worse than I expected. Though I didn’t dislike Chris Pratt in it, which seems like a whole lot.

Spider-Man 3 (2007, Sam Raimi)

After having two decent Danny Elfman scores similar to his two Batman scores, Raimi brought in composer Christopher Young, who does a terrible job, sure, but also mimics the (non-Elfman) score to Batman Forever. The music in this film makes the ears bleed.

In theory, following the great financial and critical success of Spider-Man 2, Raimi should have been able to do whatever he wanted with this entry. And maybe he did. But if he did, his truest intent for a Spider-Man movie was to make an unbearable one.

It’s real bad. The only thing the film has going for it is James Franco. It ought to have Thomas Haden Church in the plus column too, but the handling of his character is exceptionally bad. Haden Church barely gets any screen time and the film ends without resolving whether his innocent, sickly daughter is going to die or not.

Topher Grace’s villain, the evil Spider-Man, is exceptionally lame. Have I already used exceptionally in this response? I’ll use it again. Just awful, awful writing. Grace is almost mediocre, but can’t essay the character properly; he instills too much sitcom charm.

Tobey Maguire apparently didn’t even bother getting in shape for this one. Raimi gives him an evil mop haircut at one point, for his evil scenes, so the viewer knows he’s bad.

J.K. Simmons is good and Elizabeth Banks finally gets some decent lines.

So it’s not a completely awful film, just extremely close to one.

Terminator Salvation (2009, Joseph McGinty Nichol), the director’s cut

Ok, no joke, what idiot thought adding Christian Bale to Terminator 4 was a good idea? Was it McG? Without the dumb connection to the previous films–if it had just been the adventures of Anton Yelchin’s Young Kyle Reese–it might have been fine. Nichol’s direction isn’t anything spectacular (it’s solid enough, surprisingly), but he doesn’t fetishize the Terminator world. The callbacks to the originals are at least amusing, since they’re trying for subtly.

Sure, it’s a knockoff of Road Warrior with a little Return of the Jedi thrown in but whatever, it’s not complete garbage. It’s at least diverting, more than Terminator 3, in fact.

However, then there’s Bale. Oh, wait, no way. Bale’s got the goatee to look tough (and less like a date rapist?).

Sam Worthington’s wasted. If I hadn’t seen Rogue, I’d have no idea he was good. Though he can’t hold his accent.

The script’s awful, but Nichol’s shoots it so large scale (studio franchise pictures with establishing shots, I’d missed those), it’s like Terminator‘s less about its actual content than that content’s presentation. Brancato and Ferris probably don’t have the writing chops of a good “Days of Our Lives” writers’ room and have some of the most lamely predictable “surprises” I can remember. But I suppose the script’s better than their Terminator 3 script, even if the nonsensical items–the Terminator base, the networked machine base, having manual, physical overrides.

If you haven’t been able to tell yet, this post’s going to be double length, just because there’s so much to talk about. Not the content, of course, but the film as an example of the decline of popular filmmaking.

Helena Bonham Carter is really bad. Laughable. She just gets worse and worse, doing some kind of impression of The Emperor from the Star Wars series.

Common’s awful. Michael Ironside’s embarrassing himself here.

Watching Bryce Dallas Howard act opposite Moon Bloodgood is pretty funny too. I’ve never seen Bloodgood in anything before and haven’t seen Howard in years–I figured the former would be bad and the latter okay. I was wrong. Very wrong.

Still, whoever did the special effects went cheap on the big “old” Terminators, which are clearly guys in costumes. And the thing when Worthington’s walking around half-Terminator or whatever, it looks awful, cheaper than a Halloween mask, even if they are doing some idiotic CG composite thing with it.

Terminator Salvation comes after The Matrix, so there are plenty of lifts from it (though the giant Transformer-like robots are not)–the whole prophet thing with Bale feels directly copied and pasted from The Matrix 2.

Unexpectedly first-rate is the Danny Elfman score. As much of a Brad Fiedel fan as I am, Elfman’s pure action score is great. There’s nothing playful to it, which is somewhat non-Elfman (at least the Elfman I know), but it’s such a solid piece of composing, it doesn’t seem at all lacking.

Maybe most offensively, they dedicated this crap to Stan Winston.