Weird Science.

Before Berk and I head off to procure a Golden Ticket back to Hogwarts, some thoughts on Tim Burton’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Well, for the most part, I dug it — it definitely didn’t feel as throwaway as Burton’s recent Planet of the Apes (or Big Fish, for that matter.) In fact, dare I say, it seemed more subversively Dahl-esque to me than the much beloved Gene Wilder version. That being said, I also thought the film grew forced as it went along — The most magical moments happen before Charlie even ventures onto the factory grounds. Alas, as with many Wonka delicacies, that initial rush doesn’t last, and the film grows less absorbing and more sickly-sweet as the children meander through the Land of Chocolate.

Speaking of the kids, though, they’re all pitch-perfect — it’s hard to imagine a more Charlie-ish Charlie than Freddie Highmore, a more Veruca-ish Veruca than Julia Winter, and so on through the Starting Five. I also found most of the modern tweaks they’d given the contestants quite clever (Mike Teavee as a gamehead, Violet Beaureguard’s mom as an Atlanta suburbanite Showbiz Mom, Violet herself as a kung-fu master.) As for the other denizens of Wonkaland, I frankly grew a bit tired of the Oompa-Loompas’ antics after awhile, although it’s nice to see a journeyman fanboy stalwart like Deep Roy get his moment(s) in the spotlight.

And Depp? Well, he’s weird, and — I’ll give him credit — weird in a totally non-Hunter S. Thompson-ish way. Even with the added-on humanizing backstory and somewhat unnecessary character arc, this Wonka is much more akin to the one the UN should be inspecting than the avuncular, approachable Wilder. To be honest, I can’t really figure out if his performance — part-Batman villain, part-gleeful-pre-teen, part-Rainbow Randolph-style TV host (Depp says he had Capt. Kangaroo types in mind) — is brilliantly off-putting or aggravatingly one-note. I do know that I probably wouldn’t want to sit through a Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator if Depp kept this up…Too much just makes ya sick.

Still, Depp, Burton, & co. deserve points for pushing Wonka in a completely different direction than did Wilder in the 1971 version. And that, in the end, is this Charlie‘s big plus: Unlike entirely too many unnecessary remakes of late, the film seems to have a reason for being other than audience nostalgia, and can co-exist happily with both the Dahl book and the Wilder film without doing dishonor to the memory of either. Just consider it the Sourz or Wild Berry version.

Everybody Knows.

So, in keeping with my usual Independence Day and unBirthday ritual of going to the movies (My b-day is December 29, my brother‘s is January 2 — as these dates fall uncomfortably close to Christmas, we received our birthday gifts on July 4th when I was a kid — whether or not this personal validation on America’s birthday every year played a part in my pursuing a career in US history is still an open question), I went to check out the exceedingly well-reviewed Me and You and Everyone We Know, written, directed, and starring performance artist Miranda July, at the new IFC Center (a.k.a. the old Waverly, where I lost my keys during Apollo 13 a decade ago.) And? Well, July definitely has an original and distinctive voice, and I can see why some critics loved this film. But, frankly, her voice is also one that didn’t speak to me very much. Me and You deserves credit for its sunny disposition and dogged faith in people, I suppose, but frankly, after ninety minutes I found the whole enterprise a bit stilted and twee.

So the upshot is this…Miranda July is a struggling video artist who one day decides she’ll be smitten with John Hawkes (Deadwood‘s Sol Starr), a soon-to-be-divorced shoe salesman who tries (and fails) to connect with his distant kids Peter and Robby (Miles Thompson and Brandon Ratcliff) through ill-thought-out stunts such as lighting his hand on fire. I came in figuring that this July-Hawkes romance was the centerpiece of the film, and I was basically in for a smart, indy-inclined romantic comedy. But, in fact, Me and You spends as much or more time with Everyone They Know, from Hawkes’ creepy, pedophile-in-training partner in the shoe department to two sexually adventurous teenage classmates of Peter’s to the little girl next door, who has developed a slightly disturbing penchant of collecting a “dowry” of home appliances in her hope chest.

If this is starting to sound like a Todd Solondz movie, well we’re in the same ballpark. But, unlike the relentlessly dark and downbeat Solondz, July’s universe is a much shinier, happier place, where (in one of the more affecting scenes in the film) even a lowly and abandoned goldfish is loved by many and doted on in its final moments. And, at times, July’s “bright-side-of-life” vision was truly transporting, as when Hawkes is distracted from the final collapse of his marriage by the sight of a bird alighting outside. (“Banish all dismay, extinguish every sorrow. If I’m lost or I’m forgiven, the birds will still be singing.“)

Whatsmore, what seems to be July’s wider theme is an intriguing one — we live in a world where me, you, and everyone we know are likely more comfortable communicating by keyboards, cellphones, photographs, video, or other interpolating media than we are by simple voice or touch. After awhile, though, I confess I found myself pining for something more akin to Solondz’s trademark misanthropy. Despite nice moments scattered here and there, I found too much of this film precious and quirky for its own sake, and it began to feel less like a movie than a series of video art vignettes at the Whitney. Take it with a grain of salt — again, I could see this movie being more appealing to warmer, gentler, and less cynical souls…but, as for myself, I have to admit I had emotionally checked out by the last reel.

Close Encounters of the Worst Kind.

“Across the gulf of space…intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us.” Hey, don’t say L. Ron Hubbard didn’t try to warn us. At any rate, Spielberg’s take on War of the Worlds is a gritty, eye-popping ride at first, but ultimately ends up being a disappointing affair. In short, it too often abandons the eponymous conflict for pained bouts of family melodrama and lots of Signs-like crashing about in a basement.

I’m aggravated by this film more than most, because from the lightning storm in the first fifteen minutes to the incident at the Hudson River ferry about halfway in, War showed flashes of amazing promise at times. With their introduction from below and their commence-the-killing foghorns, the tripods were spindly alien nightmares, just as they should be. Some of the humanity adrift sequences didn’t make much sense (Why do the news crew cannibalizing the downed plane act starved 12 hours into Day 1 of the attack? How could everything else be picked over by then?), but I particularly liked the swarm of panic and rage surrounding the sight of the Cruise family’s working van. And, while using blatant and Dubyaesque terror, terror, terror, 9/11, 9/11, 9/11 imagery seems like something of an easy shortcut (and how was that “missing persons” board near the ferry created so quickly, in such a random place?), it still helped augment the apocalyptic gloom that an adapation of War of the Worlds needs front-and-center.

But, alas, amidst all this armageddon, we’re forced to take multiple timeouts so that Tom Cruise and his kids can work out their unresolved family issues. You have to expect some of this in a Spielberg movie, sure, but it still seems like filler, pretty much every time. And it seriously detracts from the terror War is trying to invoke when one starts counting the character beats until the unavoidable group hug. Moreover, when we get to the interminable basement of Crazy-Eyez Robbins, the film just stops dead. (I know there was a similar sequence in the 1953 George Pal film, but frankly I don’t remember enough to compare the two.) After all the rabid, contagious fear of teeming, ant-like humanity that permeates the first hour, why would we want to watch Cruise, Robbins, and Fanning play hide-and-seek for twenty minutes with that Abyss-like tentacle? (Particularly given that we saw Cruise already do this with the ID spiders in Minority Report.) As a result, by the time Team Cruise gets to (a surprisingly undamaged) Boston for the cathartic group hug, I’d pretty much checked out. Unfortunately, despite a captivating first hour, War of the Worlds eventually bogs down into quagmire.

Bats in the Cradle.

This just in from the Gotham Gazette: Much of the city’s criminal element are packing off for Metropolis to try their luck with Supes…cause, well, this “Bat Man” fellow is just plain terrifying. Yes, y’all, I’m happy to report that, while Chris Nolan’s Batman Begins has some minor problems — each character gets a few clunky lines and the final action sequence isn’t all that memorable — this is the Batman movie that fans of the Dark Knight have been waiting for. There’s no Schumacher statuary in this Gotham City, and nary a Burtonesque Batdance to be had. Nope, this is just straight-up Frank Miller-style Batman, scaring the bejeezus out of the underworld in his inimitable fashion. [Spoilers to follow.]

Going in, I was mostly afraid that all the ninja training and Liam Neeson speaking in Qui-Gonisms that marked the trailers was going to take up half the film. But, to its credit, Batman Begins moves at a surprisingly brisk clip, interspersing Bruce Wayne’s travels in the Orient (as we begin, he’s doing hard time in a Eastern prison) with flashbacks of various fateful moments in his early life. Bale and Neeson in particular are encumbered by some potentially ponderous dialogue here — fear is the mindkiller type stuff — but they do well with it (as does Michael Caine, Gary Oldman, Cillian Murphy, Tom Wilkinson…everybody, really, even Katie Holmes.)

And, when Wayne gets back to Gotham, the film really takes flight. If the message boards are any indication, some of the fanboy nation are ticked that you never get a really good look at Bats in any of the fight sequences — he’s always flitting from shadow to shadow or bringing a beat-down from above. But I for one loved it…as seen from common-thug-level, this incarnation of Batman is — finally — downright scary. (And, speaking of scary, the Scarecrow has a devilishly creepy introduction here.) Whatsmore, Nolan and screenwriter David Goyer wisely play up the “Bruce Wayne, billionaire playboy” angle too, which is as important a subterfuge as Clark Kent’s bumbling around the Daily Planet.

Problems? Like I said, yeah, a few. The Batmobile chase scene is a bit gratuitous, and the final action extravaganza isn’t all that involving. (Also, as one astute AICN reader pointed out, the microwave emitter scenario should have had a much more disastrous effect on the “bags of mostly water” surrounding it.) I’d have liked to see even more of the Fear-vision (particularly as that whole sequence reminded of me of Swamp Thing’s visit to Gotham in the Alan Moore years.) It seems like calling in the “back-up” would likely give away the location of the Batcave. Taking out Wayne Manor was a bit extreme. And, to my mind, Batman never really needs a love interest, aside from Catwoman, Poison Ivy, or the like.

But these are all quibbles. In the big picture, Batman Begins is a rousing success, and I want to see Batman Continues next-to-immediately…particularly after that you-know-what at the end. (!) After all, even with the considerable star power on display here, Gotham’s still one card short of a full deck…

Love is a Battlefield.

Ok, I know that I shouldn’t have been expecting much more than some eye candy, a few decent action sequences and two hours of air conditioning. But, I’ll admit, I was disappointed by Mr. & Mrs. Smith — Director Doug Liman did a great job with The Bourne Identity a few years ago, and I generally root for both Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. But, while Pitt is as aw-shucks amiable as usual (his stint in Troy aside) and Jolie is, as always, very easy on the eyes, there just isn’t much here. Sure, marriage as war is a metaphor that’s been mined pretty thoroughly over the years…but one can usually still find choicer nuggets than the ones making up this flick. In short, the script is half-baked and the action is overdone.

Beginning with a marriage counselor interview intercut with the credit sequence (it plays a bit like the opening to The Incredibles) followed by a meet-cute in Colombia “five or six years earlier,” Smith seems intriguing enough at first glance…sort of an actioner by way of a Steven Soderbergh film. But the movie then takes way too long establishing its central conceit — we’re a good forty minutes in before the spy vs. spy angle is worked out — particularly given that Pitt and Jolie seem so woefully out of place in the burbs.

That being said, the early going is probably the film’s better half. Once the two start going after each other, and particularly after the big marital mano-a-mano, the movie takes several increasingly graceless lapses into absurdity. Most of the big action setpieces, particularly the finale in a department store, not only don’t make any narrative sense but have zero danger to them. (Really, what was the point of setting up these two as crack shots at the Coney Island fairground, if they continually miss each other from point-blank range? These Agents Smith are even more bullet-proof than Hugo Weaving in The Matrix.)

Action aside, the script also takes a turn for the hammy as Mr. & Mrs. Smith progresses. The more Pitt and Jolie begin to discover about each other, the less and less they sound like a married couple. And, after awhile, the movie’s ingratiating penchant of doing just about anything for a laugh, from funny faces to cat sound effects to Air Supply and “The Girl from Ipanema,” gets kinda tiresome. (Particularly egregious in this regard is every scene with Vince Vaughn, where the same “living at home with mom” joke is made over and over again.) By the time The OC‘s Adam Brody flaunts his Fight Club T-shirt while getting grilled by Pitt, I had had enough already. What can I say? I really thought Mr. & Mrs. Smith was gonna work out, but eventually, the thrill was gone.

Time out of Mind.

What would you do if you had a time machine, albeit one that only lets you travel backward for as long as you’re willing to sit in a souped-up cardboard box? Well, chances are a lot of us may end up taking a page from Abe and Aaron, the two well-dressed, Wired-subscribing, jargon-spouting, and thoroughly scientifical protagonists of Primer. Find a way to impress your friends, make a quick buck on the stock market, that type of thing. But, frankly, figuring out what to do is the least of your problems, because pretty soon you might have other ideas, in which case you’ll get in the way, and then you’ll have to be taken care of.

Confused? Not as confused as you’ll be after leaving this intriguing and perplexing sci-fi flick. Written, directed, produced and acted in by Shane Carruth on a purported budget of $7000, Primer flaunts its incomprehensibility from the get-go, as Abe and Aaron speak in technobabble riddles while cannibalizing their home appliances to construct a strange device in the latter’s garage. Soon enough, they discover their bizarre gravity-defying invention can run without batteries for a time and has a strange side-effect on weebles, one that might have some interesting and remunerative real-world applications…

And then things get really confusing, as multiple Abes and Aarons begin living out the same time period, often working at cross-purposes to each other. Seriously, with the possible exception of the MIT guys who threw the time travel conference, I don’t think anybody’s going to be able to piece together exactly what happens in this movie the first time through. But, the general inscrutability of it all is part of the atmosphere. We never really understand what’s going on, and I could see some folks getting frustrated with this film — usually, incomprehensibility is not a strong suit in movies. Still, for some reason, Primer works as a heady sci-fi tone poem about the cryptic (and dire) consequences of mucking about with the timestream. Mostly unfathomable, sure, but if you’re a fan of the genre, it’s definitely worth catching sometime…perhaps yesterday.

Washington in Rome.

“Why should his name be sounded more than yours? Write them, yours is as fair; Sound them, Yours doth become the tongue as well.” Why? Well, cause he’s a full-fledged movie star, that’s why. Still, despite having a bit of a muttering problem at times, Denzel acquits himself “honorably” as Brutus in Julius Caesar, which I saw last night at the Belasco Theatre. Set in a half-post-apocalyptic, half-Depression-era Rome that evokes anything from Masked & Anonymous to Black Hawk Down, this version of Shakespeare’s classic is innovatively staged and well-worth seeing, but, unfortunately, it also suffers from a stylistic dissonance that hinders the play at its most crucial moments.

The central problem with this production is the clash of acting methods. Many of the actors — and particularly Denzel — underplay their roles to the extreme. In fact, in delivery if not in diction, Denzel’s naturalistic Brutus is only a step or two from most of his other performances, be it Glory, Devil in a Blue Dress, or The Manchurian Candidate. That would be fine, if everyone else was on the same page, and a lot of the other actors are. Jack Willis (at left) deadpans Casca like Cypher from The Matrix, and Patrick Page steals his one major scene (in which he convinces Caesar to report to the Senate on the Ides of March) by portraying Decius Brutus as the worst kind of unctuous DC aide, complete with a leather executive folder in tow and a flatterer’s simper plastered on his face.

Unfortunately, some of the other actors didn’t get the memo. Bill Sadler’s Caesar is prone to acts of grandstanding, but that’s acceptable — he’s Caesar, after all, and bestrides the narrow world like a Colossus. No, the main offender is Colm Feore as Cassius, who plays the lean, hungry Machiavel in full “Master Thespian” mode — at times he’s hammier here than he was in Riddick. I’ll admit, I may be being a bit hard on Feore, as Cassius has always been one of my favorite Shakespearean characters (well, until he gets all weepy and high-maintenance in the second half of the play.) And Feore’s performance might be fine for a different cast of Caesar…but here, he’s just off. If this is Denzel’s Julius Caesar, as everything seems to suggest, Feore’s portrayal of Cassius should have mirrored Denzel’s low-key, understated Brutus. Instead, Feore is overplaying to the hilt, and the contrast is jarring in every scene the two central plotters share.

The Denzel-disconnect causes problems elsewhere, too, notably in the crucial Act III funeral speeches. Eamonn Walker makes a fine Mark Antony throughout, but he just doesn’t have the star wattage or natural charisma of Denzel Washington. As a result, Antony’s manipulative eulogy — the critical hinge moment of the play — seems slightly tepid and uninvolving compared to Brutus’ earlier rousing oratory. It’s possible that I’m just ruined by the James Mason-Marlon Brando version, as there does seem to be some precedent in the play for this take: “I am no orator, as Brutus is…I have neither wit, nor words, nor worth, action, nor utterance, nor the power of speech, to stir men’s blood.” Still, I think there’s a dramatic problem if Brutus’ oration is more of a showstopper than Antony’s. If anything, it seems here that their roles should have been reversed.

Still, despite these grievances, Julius Caesar is a satisfying production for the most part, with some particularly nice visual flourishes throughout. The Escape from New York, Berlin-bunker look of the set seems strange at first, but gains potency as the play darkens — in the “Cinna the poet” mob scene, for example. (Speaking of which, between this and Sith, it’s been a bad week for republics.) And I particularly liked the look of the Senate, even if it was somewhat reminiscent of Liev Schrieber’s EXCOMM war room in the Henry V revival two years ago. (With that in mind, the play gets off a great Homeland Security gag, as the various conspirators have to figure out a way around the Senate metal detector.)

The war scenes of the final acts are also surprisingly kinetic, with Roman forces garbed in guerilla green or black weaving through the hollowed-out set and spouting commands in verse. In fact, while I guess this shouldn’t be a shock given the subject matter, this production of Julius Caesar is also quite grisly — they don’t skimp on the blood and gore, and Sadler’s corpse is frozen in a horrifying Ring-like rictus scream during the Antony speech. (Strangely, this produced nary a shudder in the crowd, while the mere sight of Caesar’s bare posterior earlier on sent the audience into a paroxysm of shocked gasps — the MPAA has screwed up this country something fierce.)

So, in sum, Julius Caesar is a worthy production that makes for a good evening out, but it’s got some issues that keep it from being an all-time classic version of the play. The fault, dear readers, is not in its stars, but in its supporting cast, that they are underlings. In the end, a more balanced production, with either more or less star power, would have probably worked out better.

Dog With Two Bones.

I’m a bit late on this one now, but a friend and I caught Unleashed last Friday and, well, it’s not much to write home about. As you’ve probably figured out from the previews, Jet Li plays Bob Hoskin’s trained pet enforcer, conditioned to beat the everloving heck out of sundry ne’er-do-wells whenever his collar is removed. (He spends the rest of his time living in a cage and poring mournfully over an A-B-C book.) One day, however, Li is inadvertently released into the wild, whereupon he encounters blind piano tuner Morgan Freeman and learns the ways of life and family (and, yes, even love)…until his old master comes a-knockin’.

That’s it in a nutshell, but it makes even less sense on film than it does on paper. Occasionally, Jet Li in the early “trained” scenes shows less capability for independent thought than Berkeley — he stands blankly as his erstwhile mates are attacked, so long as the collar is on. Yet, he also seems to be a fully capable human — understanding relatively complex instructions and distinguishing readily between combatants and non-combatants (and between thugs and leaders.) So what is he, really? Here’s an example of the problem: Apparently piano music soothes the savage beast, so Freeman and his step-daughter (Kerry Condon) take it upon themselves to teach Li how to play. “Notes are symbols,” Condon explains to Li, who gets it right away. But if he doesn’t know what “note” means (or “ice cream,” or “melon,” etc.) why would he know what a “symbol” is? Who knows – maybe Oliver Sacks runs into this kinda thing every day, but it still doesn’t hold up.

Of course, whether or not the story makes sense is completely moot — We paid $10 to see Jet Li kick ass. And, to its credit, the movie delivers right away, opening with Li taking out a sizable gang in inmitable Yuen Woo Ping fashion. All the fight scenes are extremely kinetic — there’s a scene near the end where Li faces off against another random kung-fu master in a bathroom, and it may just eclipse the similar Morpheus-Agent Smith fight in the original Matrix (also choreographed by Yuen.) But sadly, the fights in Unleashed are just too few and far between. Instead, we’ve got a solid hour in the middle of Li (who’s very good throughout) discovering the supermarket and learning table manners.

In short, if you need a patently ridiculous plot device just to get your kung-fu movie off the ground, so be it — bring on the fighting. But please don’t skip on the melees to build your movie around said plot device, ’cause, frankly, that dog won’t hunt.

Return of the Jedi.

Well, that was a happy surprise. Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith is by no means a perfect film. But, the reviews are right — this one’s miles above the other two prequels, and definitely can be considered in the same breath as Jedi. Sure, there’s a bad movie occasionally lingering in the shadows like a Sith, but for the most part this entry manages to capture some of that ole Star Wars feel, particularly in the opening rescue attempt and final hour. (And, unlike Menace and Clones, this one actually improves on a second viewing.)

So, what’s good? Well, while Ian McDiarmid gets in some choice scenery-chewing (particlarly once he goes Jedi) and Ewan McGregor steals the show with his canniest Alec Guinness impression yet, Hayden Christiansen is actually surprisingly decent this time around. The (mercifully brief) love scenes between he and a barely-used Natalie Portman are still stilted and sluggish, sure, but otherwise Christiansen acquits himself much better (It turns out the whiny-teenager schtick of Clones may have indeed been an acting choice.)

Whatsmore, barring a few hiccups here and there (Yoda really shouldn’t be used as Basil Exposition — It makes his syntax sound even more ridiculous), a lot of the “let’s take a meeting” scenes that so marred the first two prequels have a real dynamism to ’em in Sith. In fact, dare I say it, I actually found the court intrigue somewhat interesting this time — With Anakin caught between the machinations of Chancellor Palpatine and the distrust of the increasingly intransigent Jedi Order, there’re no tears shed over the taxation of trade routes or somesuch, and hardly a Jar Jar sighting to be had.

Our old embarrassment Mistah Binks may be sidelined this go around (as are a lot of the other random, useless characters of the first two prequels: I’m looking at you, Captain Typho), but Sith takes pleasure in harking back to old friends from the OT, among them an extended cameo by Chewbacca, a brief shot of Wayne “Scorpius” Pygram as Grand Moff Tarkin, and several scenes set in the Tantive IV. I was worried these types of nods would seem blatant and graceless, but for the most part they were handed quite well, and, indeed, turned out to be definite fanboy crowd-pleasers.

Yep, there’s a lot to like here…the opening shot, General Grievous, the Coruscant opera, all the amazing design flourishes by the ILM guys. In fact, even stuff that has no business working, like Ewan riding that goofy lizard all over Utapau, somehow ended up being kinda Tauntaun-like and un-prequel-ish.

But…that doesn’t mean there aren’t problems. I’ve already mentioned the love scenes, and they’re pretty egregious. And at times, frankly, the film still just goes slack. Anakin and Obi-Wan’s final conversation before the Big Duel (the one that’s being quoted for its obvious Dubya references) should be a climactic moment in the saga, but it ends up seeming kinda stilted and poorly written. (“My allegiance is to the republic, and democracy…and, and cheese!”) Similarly the mano-a-mano between Yoda and the Emperor should seem one for the ages. But it’s never quite clear exactly why Yoda chooses to pull a Bishop-from-Aliens at the end, and lines like “Not if anything to say about it I have” just stop the film dead.

And, as a fanboy aside: While there are plenty of amazing and well-realized new worlds in Episode III, they all seem like they’re 30 seconds away from each other, with people popping back and forth between Coruscant and the Outer Rim in mid-sentence. What the heck happened to technology in the intervening two decades between III and IV? For some reason, Artoo loses tons of functionality, the Death Star takes 20 years to build, and the Millennium Falcon spends long stretches of time traveling in hyperspace, when back in the day Jedi apparently just snapped their fingers to get from place to place?

Also, why would Padme get kicked out of the Senate just for having a baby? And, for that matter, why is prenatal care so godawful in the Republic? Even notwithstanding the surprise-twins thing, that birthing robot with the scoop-hands looked like a torture droid.

But, obviously, these are nit-picks, and the fact that I’m picking nits rather than huge tumescent tumors from Sith is a mark of how much better this outing is than Clones. Ok, the end of the film drags just a bit, and the Obi-Wan/Anakin duel isn’t quite as viscerally exciting as the Maul melee of Menace, but for the most part I sat through Sith — both times! — with a big fanboy grin on my face. He definitely whiffed twice, but on his third swing, Lucas at least hit a triple here…it’s just too bad he didn’t recapture his mojo earlier. To paraphrase Palpatine, “Old fool. Only now, at the end, do you understand…“

Welcome to the layer cake, son.

Disgruntled supporters of mutantkind, take heart: X3 is in very good hands. I caught Matthew Vaughn’s Layer Cake this afternoon, and it’s a smart, stylish, and sublimely smooth British crime film that does Guy Ritchie’s Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch one better. Well, ok, Layer Cake isn’t as laugh-out-loud funny as Lock Stock can be at times, but it’s much cleverer than Snatch and, frankly, better-made. And, for that matter, it takes less joy in violence for its own sake than Ritchie’s oeuvre (one grisly scene set to Duran Duran’s “Ordinary World” notwithstanding.) In fact, in terms of tone, Cake is probably more akin to Jonathan Glazer’s Sexy Beast.

Layer Cake centers on cocaine dealer Daniel Craig (burnishing his possible Bond credentials), a consummate smooth operator who treats his criminal enterprise like a business and, as per the usual, is just looking forward to an early retirement around the corner. But his best-laid plans are interrupted by two ugly developments: 1) His boss Jimmy (Kenneth Cranham) enlists him to track down the junkie daughter of even bigger crime-lord Eddie Temple (Michael Gambon, relishing the dark side), and 2) a loose cannon flunky known as the Duke (Jamie Foreman of I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead and Roman Polanski’s forthcoming Oliver Twist) has just rolled in from Amsterdam trying to unload a million doses of Ecstasy (a drug haul with a nefarious history of its own.)

The rest of the movie consists of Craig trying to navigate the increasingly narrow straits between these two troubles, with the occasional aid of muscle Colm Meaney, middle-man George Harris, and a host of other ne’er-do-wells. Essentially, you know the drill — this is a puzzle film in which you’ll have to listen carefully and learn to distinguish between various delinquents with names like Tiptoes, Kinky, Slasher and Shanks. And, while the final few grifts just get a bit too big to be believable, for the most part the story holds together with intelligence and verve, in no small part to Daniel Craig, who’s a magnetic presence here, and Matthew Vaughn, who displays a crisp, confident direction that’s all the more impressive for being showy without ever seeming flashy. To him, his X-Men.