Reviews

Movies

The Wicker Man

Directed by Neil LaBute, starring Nicolas Cage, Ellen Burstyn

A tough task, remaking The Wicker Man, especially when you insist on making a few major narrative changes. Director Neil LaBute, having hit a home run a few years back with his mini masterpiece of machismo, In the Company of Men, is nonetheless a strange choice to helm a horror-slash-thriller redo and the pick for the lead does not instill great confidence either. Nicolas Cage steps into the shoes originally worn by Edward Woodward, although it was always going to be nigh impossible to get Cage to mimic Woodward's understated manner.

No longer set in Scotland as in the original, we now move to California where traumatized cop, Edward Malus (Cage), gets a letter from his former fiancee saying that her daughter is missing. Malus then travels to the island colony where his ex lives, only to find that the place is run by odd women whose fashions and customs have not moved on from the 19th century. As the search for the child goes on, Malus discovers that the ladies here don't mind a bit of ritual sacrifice to ensure a bumper crop. But who do they want to kill? Could it be the kid?

Even if you have not seen the vastly superior original, you'll probably cotton onto what will happen to Malus long before it actually does. Cage's performance is a strange one: When he's not acting befuddled he continually breaks character to adopt a mock tone. The cast of women overacts with wild abandon while the femo-bashing subtext asks more questions of writer-director LaBute than it does religion, or anything else in his broad line of sight. All of this makes the experience more annoying than disturbing. Ben Davey

Invincible

Directed by Ericson Core, starring Mark Wahlberg, Greg Kinnear

Those who like to watch Mark Wahlberg run in slow motion, his Adonis-like endowments bouncing with the wind in his hair, are in luck. Invincible's director Ericson Core - here making his debut feature - doesn't mind going bananas with slow motion, as long as nuggets of '70s rock play over the top. Soulful tunes and American football packaged together: Hasn't this all been done before? The answer, of course, is yes. Fortunately, however, this is a film that uses old tricks and comes up with surprisingly good results.

It tells the true-life story of Vince Papale (Wahlberg), a down and out 30-year-old bartender who earned a spot on NFL team, The Philadelphia Eagles, after turning up to a public tryout session. Having had his share of hard knocks, Papale comes from a neighborhood where football is one of the only diversions from a dreary existence. Unemployment is rife and even those with jobs can see the guillotine dangling over their necks. To those around him, Papale's achievement becomes emblematic of winning against the odds.

If this all sounds cliche, you're right, it is. But thanks to a natural, understated performance from Wahlberg and great support from Greg Kinnear who plays the Eagles' then-coach, Dick Vermeil, Invincible succeeds despite its adherence to an all-too-familiar formula. Credit must be given to Core's gritty photography, particularly of Papale's South Philadelphia stomping ground, which channels Rocky's working class squalor. Most importantly though is the way that the cast manage to make a script full of sporting cliches sound, well, genuine. BD

(China Daily 08/03/2007 page20)