Movie Review: Disturbia (2007)

Genre: Thriller  

Director: D.J. Caruso  

Starring: Shia LaBeouf, Carrie-Anne Moss, David Morse, Sarah Roemer, Viola Davis  

Running Time: 105 minutes  

Synopsis: Depressed after losing his father in a car accident, teenager Kale (Shia LaBeouf) strikes his Spanish teacher and earns a sentence of house arrest for three months. With little to keep him occupied, Kale clashes with his mother Julie (Carrie-Anne Moss), but eventually settles down to a routine of spying on the neighbours. Newly arrived girl-next-door Ashley (Sarah Roemer) catches his eye, but more menacing is neighbour Robert Turner (David Morse), who may or may not be a fugitive serial killer.

What Works Well: This reimagining of Hitchcock's Rear Window is formulated for a younger audience, and enjoys a likeable cast led by Shia LaBeouf (understandably glum but sensitive), Sarah Roemer (every teenage boy's dream sexy-and-smart girl-next-door), and Aaron Yoo (as Kale's best friend Ronnie). As they get into deeper trouble snooping on the neighbourhood, co-writers Christopher Landon and Carl Ellsworth sneak in snide commentary about the suburbs as a place where secrets (whether bland or malevolent) hide behind every hedge.

What Does Not Work As Well: Director D.J. Caruso never quite gets the tone right. For too long the plot embraces the light-hearted humorous adventures of a troubled young man and the beginnings of puppy love, but the third act suddenly descends into all-out horror territory. Not enough time is spent with the antagonist, who remains a shell of boogeyman, robbing the climax of impact. 

Conclusion: The curtains and shades are there for a reason.

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Movie Review: Unthinkable (2010)

Genre: Torture Drama  

Director: Gregor Jordan  

Starring: Samuel L. Jackson, Carrie-Anne Moss, Michael Sheen, Stephen Root  

Running Time: 97 minutes  

Synopsis: Terrorist Yusuf (Michal Sheen), a former member of Delta Force, releases a video claiming to have armed three nuclear devices for detonation in different US cities within three days, but does not reveal the locations. He then allows himself to be arrested. The FBI's Agent Helen Brody (Carrie-Anne Moss) and a CIA black-ops operative known only as H (Samuel L. Jackson) are recruited to interrogate Yusuf. H is an expert at brutal torture techniques to extract information at any cost, horrifying Helen. Meanwhile, Yusuf is well-prepared for his ordeal.

What Works Well: The Peter Woodward script is charged with the debate around the efficacy of torture when countless lives are at stake. The torture scenes are suitably disturbing, and the performances by Samuel L. Jackson and Michael Sheen descend to the depths of human cruelty, starting from different origins but arriving at the same depraved destination.

What Does Not Work As Well: The balance between plot drivers and abuse tactics is never achieved. Director Gregor Jordan invests too much repetitive time in the torture chamber, well after the point is made that H and Yusuf are two sides of the same no-limits coin. Yusuf's motivations and demands are barely sketched-in, leaving a hollow space where fuel for his fire ought to reside. In a world without rules, Carrie-Anne Moss struggles to convince as the voice of reason and basic morality.

Conclusion: Plenty of pain for no appreciable gain.

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Movie Review: Brain On Fire (2016)

Genre: Medical Drama

Director: Gerard Barrett

Starring: Chloë Grace Moretz, Carrie-Anne Moss, Richard Armitage, Tyler Perry, Jenny Slate

Running Time: 95 minutes

Synopsis: Susannah Cahalan (Chloë Grace Moretz) is a 21-year-old reporter at the New York Post. She starts to suffer from trance-like moments and hallucinations, and her symptoms worsen to constant headaches and disorientation, impairing her ability to function. Her co-worker Margo (Jenny Slate) and boss Richard (Tyler Perry) are exasperated, while her divorced parents Rhona and Tom (Carrie-Anne Moss and Richard Armitage) and boyfriend Stephen (Thomas Mann) try to help. Doctors misdiagnose Susannah's worsening symptoms as caused by exhaustion until Dr. Souhel Najjar (Navid Negahban) agrees to investigate her case.

What Works Well: The adaptation of Cahalan's autobiographical book raises awareness about a previously little-known brain inflammation illness, and the potential dangers of misdiagnosing physiological ailments as psychosis or schizophrenia. In the central role, a capable Chloë Grace Moretz generates sympathy and conveys the agony of a happily functioning life crashing against an inexplicable condition.

What Does Not Work As Well: Writer and director Gerard Barrett decides to focus most of the film on the slow onset of symptoms, from brief moments of dysfunction to seizures and a full-on catatonic state. The medical answer already resides in the title, but only the final 10 minutes are dedicated to a rushed diagnosis and resolution. It's almost as though only the less interesting first half of the story made it to the screen.

Conclusion: Educational, but dwells for too long in the patient waiting area.



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The Movies Of Carrie-Anne Moss

All movies starring Carrie-Anne Moss and reviewed on the Ace Black Movie Blog are linked below:

The Matrix (1999)

Memento (2000)

Chocolat (2000)

Disturbia (2007)

Unthinkable (2010)

Brain On Fire (2016)

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The Movie Star Index is here.

Movie Review: Memento (2000)

A psychological thriller, Memento hides a reasonably interesting mystery within a deliciously convoluted structure.

Most of the scenes (in colour) unfold in reverse chronological order. The film starts with Leonard (Guy Pearce) killing Teddy (Joe Pantoliano) by shooting him in the head at an abandoned warehouse. Leonard was previously an insurance investigator, but is now suffering from anterograde amnesia (short-term memory loss and the inability to form new memories), caused by a blow to the head and shock incurred on the night his wife was raped and killed.

He functions by writing notes to himself, taking Polaroid shots of important people and events, and tattooing crucial messages on his body. Leonard has been on the hunt for a man known only as "John G.", believed to have been his wife's assailant. Information revealing Teddy's real identity as John G. was provided by bartender Natalie (Carrie-Anne Moss). Earlier, Leonard helped Natalie deal with a shady man named Dodd (Callum Keith Rennie). But with Leonard unable to retain any facts, everything may not be as it seems.

In interspersed black and white scenes, Leonard is in a hotel room and on the phone with an anonymous caller, describing one of his insurance cases: a man named Sammy Jankis also suffered from anterograde amnesia, and his diabetic wife had great difficulty coping with her malfunctioning husband.

Written and directed by Christopher Nolan at the helm of his first big budget feature film, Memento is a gritty neo-noir thriller anchored by a murder mystery and featuring a deeply flawed hero, a dangerous brunette, an untrustworthy cop, an assortment of unsavoury characters, and a seedy motel.

Within a traditional narrative structure the film may have been above average but familiar. In an inventive masterstroke Nolan sequences the film in disorienting reverse order, cracking the foundation under the viewer's feet and recreating what it must be like to know nothing about what just happened. Memento demands full engagement and attention to detail, and rewards the investment with a finely crafted thriller full of twisty deceit and psychological trauma.

Gradually Nolan layers in a theme of nagging doubt about everything Leonard believes to be true. He remembers nothing, and so cannot trust anything. Even with all the scraps of notes, jumbled Polaroids and permanent tattoos, he is an easy man to take advantage of. The motel manager admits to charging him for two rooms, confident Leonard won't remember the confession.

But Nolan's ingenuity, while never descending to gimmick status, may also be a case of too much of a good thing. The black and white scenes do run chronologically and yet interfere with the already difficult task of following the main plot running backwards. It's almost impossible to mentally arrange all the film's events in proper order. This may be the point and allows for a few alternative explanations, but a level of exasperation undeniably creeps in.

Guy Pearce, Joe Pantoliano and Carrie-Anne Moss do their jobs by sticking to basic character types, this being a movie where character depth and backstories are excluded by design.

Memento stands out as a unique achievement. It threatens to outsmart itself, but is a nevertheless gripping experience.

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Movie Review: The Matrix (1999)

An innovative science fiction action classic, The Matrix is a a highly stylized merging of creativity, technology and stunning combat. The film that introduced the world to bullet time is a breathless journey to a disguised dystopian future, filled with memorable characters and no shortage of breathless thrills.

In a near-future world, computer hacker Thomas Anderson (Keanu Reeves) finds himself sucked into an underground conspiracy. Anderson tangles with government agent types, and then meets Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss), a rebel member who connects Anderson with her leader Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne). Morpheus recruits Thomas to the cause, and reveals the stunning reality that intelligent machines have taken over the world, and are keeping all humans in a state of suspended animation participating in an imagined reality called The Matrix, while harvesting all human energy to power the needs of the machines.

Thomas joins Morpheus' group, which includes Trinity and other rescued humans hiding out in a small levitating ship escaping detection in huge underworld sewer systems. Morpheus believes that Thomas is the One with the unique skills to combat the machines and bring down the Matrix, and names him Neo. Thomas undergoes intensive combat training before Morpheus introduces him to The Oracle (Gloria Foster), a woman who can foretell whether he is indeed the saviour. Her conclusions are vague. Morpheus is captured by the machines, Trinity and Neo fall in love, there is a traitor among the rebels, and Neo is going to have to swing into action before he has a chance to be sure of his own abilities and destiny.

The Matrix is a unique combination of thought-provoking content, a visually dazzling style, and breathless action scenes. The Wachowski brothers (Laurence, later Lana, and Andrew) create a rich cinematic experience filled with ideas to ponder about society, the role of artificial intelligence, what reality means, the power of the individual, and the importance of self-belief and love for the survival of the human race.

Similar to all of the best science fiction movies, there is no limit to the depth of the philosophical discussions that the film can prompt. But in simple terms the Matrix can represent mundane societal conformity, while also serving as a stark warning about an emerging world overwhelmed with technological influence, to the point where the needs of the machines are paramount.

Beyond the ominous science, The Matrix offers groundbreaking filmmaking imagery for the action genre. The Wachowskis combine the balletic beauty of martial arts with an impressive array of guns, slow down time while maintaining hyperactive camera work, and invent something called bullet time. The result is action redefined, bullets as active participants, new dimensions of motion created, and the previously physically impossible suddenly not only possible but necessary for survival. When Neo requests Guns. Lots of guns. prior to commencing the climactic battle, he isn't kidding, and the Wachowskis are not shy about putting them to use. The three minute lobby battle that follows sets a new standard for staging mesmeric shootouts with ornate elegance.

The look of the film is dominated by a green-black hue recalling computer monitors, while all the cool characters get to wear shades and long black leather trench coats to emphasize their extreme bad ass factors. Keanu Reeves grows into the role of Neo, his passive expressions ideally suited to the first half of the film as Thomas is awakened to a new reality. Laurence Fishburne creates the mountainous presence at the centre of the rebellion, while Carrie-Anne Moss discovers her career calling as the enigmatic Trinity.

A hyperkinetic treat for the mind and the eyes, The Matrix is a sublime triumph.

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