It's Always Darkest Before It Gets Even Darker: Thandie Newton and Hayden Christen brave the shadows in VANISHING ON 7TH STREET.

Brad Anderson knows his way around old school horror — you know, the kind that relies on atmosphere and suggestion, the kind values the power of the disturbing thought as much as or more than threateningly wielded power tools and bleeding limb-stumps. In films such as THE MACHINIST (where Christian Bale almost literally wasted away on-screen) and SESSION 9 (where David Caruso went slowly nuts listening to a tape recording) he got considerable mileage out of the power of nuance. Now, with VANISHING ON 7TH STREET, he turns the encroaching dark into a malevolent force, throwing Hayden Christensen, Thandie Newton, and John Leguizamo together to face the deadly (and digitally enhanced) shadows. “Watch this with the lights on,” is an old cliché, but in this case, it’s all too applicable.

Click on the player to hear my interview with Anderson.

Advance word suggests that the film’s atmosphere is impressive, but the plot line feels like a half-hour episode of THE TWILIGHT ZONE stretched to feature length.

PLAYDATES:

February 18

• New York, NY: Village East Cinemas

February 25

• West Los Angeles, CA: Nuart Theatre
• Denver, CO: Mayan Theatre
• Philadelphia, PA: Ritz at the Bourse

March 4

• San Diego, CA: Ken Cinema
• Royal Oak, MI: Main Art Theatre
• Portland, OR: Hollywood Theatre
• Seattle, WA: Varsity Theatre

March 11

• Palm Desert, CA: Cinemas Palme D’Or 7

March 19

• Columbus, OH: Gateway 8

You can check Magnet Releasing’s website for additional playdates.

If the trailer is any indication, Mr. Anderson may have another hit on his hands. THE VANISHING ON 7TH STREET debuts in theaters later this year.

Interestingly, on top of the expected wave of media attention focused on box office receipts and fan adulation, the film even generated some fairly high-profile political controversy, due to the perception that George Lucas had inserted some not-so-subtle Bush-bashing, with the film interpreted as a thinly-veiled commentary on the war in Iraq. Lucas himself partially disavowed this connection, insisting that the real parallel is with the Vietnam War, which was much on his mind when he first conceived the saga back in the 1970s. Nevertheless, Lucas admitted that the “parallels between what we did in Vietnam and what we’re doing in Iraq now are unbelievable.”

Of course, being the best STAR WARS film since EMPIRE STRIKES BACK isn’t saying much, when you consider what came between: RETURN OF THE JEDI, THE PHANTOM MENACE, and ATTACK OF THE CLONES. EPISODE III: REVENGE OF THE SITH is better because it lacks, for the most part, the egregiously annoying elements that marred the intervening episodes: there are no Ewoks, no Jar-Jar dialogue, no tiny tot version of Anakin blasting the bad guys like something out of a bad Disney kiddie flick. Unfortunately, there is still romance — and it’s still terribly bad; fortunately, there’s not as much of it.

In short, the film is watchable, though often ponderous and dull. The outstanding feature of the original STAR WARS was that it was fresh and energetic. At the time, Lucas’ ambition fell well within his grasp: a child of the movie-going era that yielded cynical ’70s paranoid thrillers like THE PARALLAX VIEW and ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN, Lucas turned back the clock to a simpler time when movies were exuberant fun. His inspirations were clearly old-time serials like FLASH GORDON, which he dressed up in modern technology, using skilled craftsmanship to make the material seem new and invigorating, even though it was all very familiar.

After Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers, in their famous PBS interview, cited the original STAR WARS as an example of archetypal mythic story-telling, Lucas gradually fell prey to a grandiose ambition that did exceed his grasp, and to a large extent that reaches its climax in REVENGE, which plays out like a Wagnerian operatic tragedy — with a humorless, heavy hand guiding the proceedings.

As if this weren’t bad enough, Lucas cannot abandon his silly kiddie pandering. The early scenes in the film are filled with ridiculous comic relief, including Keystone Cops-style droids that speak in silly voices and say things like “Uh oh” before falling beneath the Jedi sword. R2-D2 doesn’t fly this time, but he does pop up into the air like a spring-loaded practical joke.

What partially redeems the film is that its position in the saga allows for some actual suspense, with a sense of inevitable doom as all the things we have been expecting finally come to pass: the Jedi are wiped out, and Anakin Skywalker finally turns into Darth Vader. In effect, this is the only film of the prequel trilogy that tells a story worth telling.

The special effects are terribly overdone, all flash and noise instead of clean and clear. Some of the battle scenes are nicely staged, and the confrontation between Obi-Wan and Anakin/Darth Vader actually carries some measure of dramatic weight — something sadly lacking in the series since EMPIRE.

As for the alleged political subtext, it is clearly there, and just as clearly it is not specific to Iraq and George W. Bush. In the film, the Republic gives up freedom for security — didn’t Benjamin Franklin have something to say about that centuries ago? Chancellor Palpatine uses the continuing war as a pretext to manipulate popular opinion so that he can maintain and strengthen his hold on power — not too dissimilar from what happens in Orwell’s 1984. Anakin says, “If you’re not with me, you’re my enemy” — echoing a statement that harkens all the way back to the New Testament.

The only moment that feels thrown in as a contemporary dig is when Obi-Wan responds to Anakin’s statement by saying, “Only the Sith deal in absolutes.” This is clearly inconsistent with the whole STAR WARS saga, which has always been a fairy tale world of Good and Evil painted in the most absolute terms. We can either chalk this up to bad writing on the part of Lucas, or we can see it as being intentionally thrown in as a comment on the current political situation, in which the absolutist views of the current administration have led to an unprovoked war that has cost thousands of lives.

Surprisingly, amidst all the talk of politics, it seems that most (if not all) commentators have missed the homo-erotic subtext permeating the film. The love story between Anakin and Padme never generates any sparks, but the seduction of Anakin to the Dark Side by Palpatine does. During a relatively early confrontation, the chancellor croons seductively, “I can feel the Force in you!” Later, when Anakin finally turns evil, a prostrate Palpatine lets out an almost orgasmic sigh of ecstasy. (One waits in vain for him to ask Anakin, “Is that a light saber in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me.”)

Bottom line: REVENGE OF THE SITH is no masterpiece, and it comes nowhere near recapturing the glory of STAR WARS and EMPIRE STRIKES BACK. But it is a decent, if unduly serious, summer popcorn movie, filled with enough good moments to make it worth viewing, in spite of the clunky dialogue (like the use of the word “younglings” for “children,” which occurs three times and sounds more absurd each time). It’s not a total embarrassment, and discerning audiences should be grateful for that.

ABSURDITIES

In spite of the entertaining action, REVENGE OF THE SITH is flawed in a variety of fairly fundamental ways. Most obviously, on a narrative level, it falls prey to a series of plot absurdities, many of them caused by contradictions in the previous films that were left untied until this final episode. For instance, we’re clearly told that C-3PO has his memory erased (to explain why he recognizes no familiar faces in the original trilogy), but it’s not clear that the same is done to R2-D2, leaving viewers to wonder whether he does indeed recognize Yoda, et al, when they show up in Episodes IV-V.

A couple other curious omissions and/or credibility gaps:

• Anakin and Padme supposedly keep their marriage a secret. Two problems with this: 1) She is obviously pregnant, a fact everyone simply seems to ignore until near the end. 2) She shares an apartment with Anakin with a panoramic upper-floor window, easily viewed by hundreds of flying vehicles. (Apparently, there are no snooping paparazzi in a “galaxy far, far away.” Can’t you just imagine the tabloid headlines: “Princess Pregnant – Jedi Mind Tricks, or the Dark Side of the Force?”
• Late in the film, Padme tells Anakin that Obi-Wan has come by to ask about Anakin’s well-being. Two obvious questions: 1) If Padme’s marriage to Anakin is secret, why did Obi-wan come to ask her about Anakin? 2) Why didn’t the increasingly suspicious Anakin ask Question #1?
• At the conclusion, Yoda and Obi-Wan want to ensure the safety of Padme’s two newborn children. They wisely give the daughter up to adoptive parents who will raise her under their name (Organa), thus concealing her identity. But poor Luke retains his familiar “Skywalker” surname. Even worse, pondering where the boy will be safe, Yoda opts to leave him with his “family” (i.e., the step-family that Anakin met in CLONES, whom we will see in A NEW HOPE) . In effect, Yoda puts Luke on the one planet in the galaxy — Anakin’s original home! — where Darth might conceivably think of looking.

STAR WARS, EPISODE III: REVENGE OF THE SITH(2005). Written & Directed by George Lucas. Cast: Hayden Christensen, Natalie Portman, Ewan McGregor, Ian McDiramid, Jimmy Smitts, Samuel L. Jackson, Frank Oz, Christopher Lee.

Copyright 2005 Steve Biodrowski

RELATED ARTICLES:

• Review: Star Wars – The Original Trilogy
• Review: Star Wars, Episode I – The Phantom Menace
• Review: Star Wars, Episode II – Attack of the Clones
• Review: Star Wars – The Clone Wars

There’s a feeling that Doug Liman is constantly pursing the truth. On this film, everything outside of the teleportation had to feel completely real to him. In doing so, he demanded the most of everyone working with him.

—Hayden Christensen

Given all the worn out genre retreads Hollywood turns out these days, it’s nice to report that Jumper is a real breath of fresh air. Not only is it an expert thriller, taking us across the globe—from a director who obviously knows this area extremely well, given his experience on The Bourne Identity—it also is a key science-fiction topic and one that quite amazingly has never really been explored so fully before this. That is somewhat astonishing to consider, when you realize how key this concept is in science-fiction literature. It’s certainly right up there with space travel and time travel in the human imagination. And quite curiously, 20th Century Fox seems to have led the groundwork in this area when they released The Fly almost 50 years ago, in 1958. But it’s only been in the last decade or so that advances in special effects technology have reached a point where a movie like Jumper could be made so effectively. And like any science-fiction story, there will inevitably be critics who will point out several conundrums and plot holes large enough to drive a bus through (which literally happens in the movie).

To those critics, many who probably praised one of the Matt Damon-Bourne movies, I’d ask this question: Do you really believe any human being could possibly do all the things Jason Bourne does in his supposedly “realistic” spy thrillers? The point being, any critic who enjoyed the Bourne movies, has no real cause for complaint about whatever small lapses of logic may occur in Jumper. In fact, if you accept the basic premise of teleportation to begin with, there are actually far less unbelievable moments in Jumper than what Jason Bourne goes through in his three movie adventures.

Of course, Jumper director Doug Liman was the man behind The Bourne Identity and I’d say he actually comes up with a more memorable picture here, simply because it’s a fresher concept. And like the Bourne pictures, it gives us something movies can do extremely well: go around the world in only 80 minutes.

Actually, the movie is a brisk 93 minutes, so there is very little time for the scads of exposition that was needed for a bloated story like The Da Vinci Code. Here we get a simple prologue, where David Rice, as a young teenager, discovers his amazing mutant powers during a schoolyard fight with a rival bully over his future girlfriend. Soon afterwards, David finds he has the power to teleport himself to anywhere on the planet in an instant.

I think one important thing that can help people enjoy the film more, is knowing in advance some of the background for the rules of jumping. Since none of this is brought out in the film itself, here are some of the rules the filmmakers developed, as revealed in the press notes:

First, a jumper can teleport anywhere he’s seen before, even in a photograph, so long as there is a strong visual memory of it. Second, a jumper can jump to anywhere he can currently see, even if it’s just a few feet away.

In addition, special effects supervisor Joel Hynek came up with some rules for how a teleporting jump effect would occur, since as Hynek points out, “We didn’t want to see the same thing over and over throughout the movie. So there are four things that effect how a teleporting Jump occurs:

1) The Jumper’s skill level.

2) His intention — whether he’s trying to be stealthy or destructive or just having fun.

3) His emotions at the time.

4) The overall difficulty of that particular teleportation. A Jumper who is panicked is going to create a different effect than a Jumper who is feeling calm. The more upset the Jumper is, the more big effects you’ll see.”

Director Doug Liman noted he was first attracted to the story because, “it was about somebody who gets superpowers and the first thing he does with them is go out and rob a bank. I really liked the honesty of that. It was something I hadn’t seen before and as a character-driven director it really interested me. I was also drawn to how imaginative and outrageous this canvas would allow me to be. Having done two action films in a row, I was attracted to the challenge of working with these profoundly human, complex characters.”

Indeed, because the first thing David Rice (Hayden Christiensen) does with his new power is so morally dubious, the filmmakers were led to create a truly evil nemesis in the form of the elite agency known as the Paladins. It’s a CIA-like organization that is led by the true bad guy, Samuel L. Jackson, whose mission is to terminate all Jumpers—with extreme prejudice. In fact, in a nice bit of sub-text, David Rice is from that liberal American bastion of Ann Arbor, Michigan, while the government-approved Paladin organization is modeled on far-right religious zealots, whose actions would clearly be approved by Mr. Bush.  And Samuel L. Jackson revels in torturing his prey,  right up to the point of killing them, reminding us of the true horrors that current American policies have wrought, especially in light of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal.  To bring the point home, Jackson gleefully exults “nobody but God should have your kind of power,” right before he plunges his bowie knife deep into the heart of his victims.

Well, at least right-wing critics can’t claim this is a movie (like The Golden Compass) that teaches young audiences we are living in a God-less world.  Actually, Jackson’s relentlessly sadistic portrait, is the kind of over the top villain that is always a lot of fun.   As is the kinetic action of the climatic battle sequence, which sees the hero and villain jump-cutting from the Sahara desert to the streets of Tokyo, to the depths of an underwater lake, to the battle-torn countryside of Chechnya. It’s the kind of dazzling cinematic display that would no doubt have delighted Surrealist artists like Luis Bunuel and Andre Breton, especially when one throws in the obsessional L’ amour fou longing David has for his high-school sweetheart.  It’s an obsession that ultimately leads him to be found and captured by the Paladins.

Helping to create all the fun is some great cinema craft work contributed by a trio of film editors, Saar Klein and Don and Dean Zimmerman.  Cinematographer Barry Petersen beautifully photographs such far-flung exotic spots as the Sphinx in Egypt, the Roman Colosseum and the Empire State building.  Equally important is the incredibly detailed work of production designer Oliver Scholl, who had to duplicate many of the real locations, like the Colosseum on a soundstage in Toronto. His work matches the location footage flawlessly and apparently producer Lucas Foster somehow convinced the Roman authorities to allow the production to be the first film to shoot inside the Colosseum in many decades—possibly for the first time since Ray Harryhausen’s Ymir met his untimely death there at the end of 20 Million Miles to Earth!

JUMPER (2008). Directed by Doug Liman. Screenplay by David S. Goyer and Jim Uhls and Simon Kinberg, from the novel by Steven Gould. Cast: Hayden Christensen, Samuel L. Jackson, Diane Lane, Jamie Bell, Rachel Bilson, Michael Rooker, Anna Sophia Robb, Max Thieriot, Jesse James, Tom Hulce, Kristen Stewart.