Movie Review: Set It Up (2018)

Genre: Romantic Comedy  

Director: Claire Scanlon  

Starring: Zoey Deutch, Glen Powell, Lucy Liu, Taye Diggs  

Running Time: 105 minutes  

Synopsis: In New York City, Harper (Zoey Deutch) and Charlie (Glen Powell) are two overworked assistants. Harper's boss is celebrity sports journalist Kirsten (Lucy Liu), while Charlie serves venture capitalist Rick (Taye Diggs). Realizing they will not have a life unless their bosses are distracted by romance, Harper and Charlie concoct a plan to have Kirsten and Rick meet and fall in love. 

What Works Well: The writing is occasionally witty, and Zoey Deutch brings quirky self-aware energy to Harper's frazzled life. 

What Does Not Work As Well: As predictable as rom coms get, this one is beset by the protagonists meekly surrendering to obnoxious boss behaviour, and for dubious reasons. Harper is hoping to become a writer having never written anything, and Charlie at age 28 is still at the bottom rung of his career ladder (but somehow hanging on to a glamorous model as a girlfriend). Maybe Harper and Charlie deserve each other, but they don't earn central roles in any romance. The Cupid contrivances to match Rick with Kirsten (including engineering an elevator mis-hap and a kiss-cam moment at Yankee Stadium) are exceptionally far fetched.

Key Quote:

Harper: Hard-to-get makes no sense. It's evolutionarily unsound. Why would a caveman want a cave woman who was like 'Go get me food, and when you come back maybe there will be a cave for you, maybe there won't be'.

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Movie Review: Lucky Number Slevin (2006)

A raucous crime thriller, Lucky Number Slevin offers a delectable multi-faceted plot and jaunty execution. A busy story of gangland vendettas offers rich rewards and plenty of barbed wit.

After a series of seemingly unrelated murders including the killing of two bookies and a sniper attack, Goodkat (Bruce Willis) sits next to a young man at an empty bus terminal and recounts a strange story from 1979, when a struggling family was brutally annihilated as a result of a horse race fix gone wrong.

Back in the present Slevin Kelevra (Josh Hartnett) arrives in New York City to stay at the apartment of his friend Nick Fisher, who is mysteriously nowhere to be found. Jovial next-door neighbour Lindsey (Lucy Liu) makes friends with Slevin, but he is soon mistaken for Nick and abducted, twice: first by mobsters working for The Boss (Morgan Freeman), then by goons working for The Rabbi (Ben Kingsley).

The Boss and The Rabbi used to be gangland partners who ran the city's most powerful crime syndicate. Now they have fallen out, The Boss' son has been killed, and he wants Slevin to assassinate The Rabbi's son in retaliation. Meanwhile The Rabbi wants Slevin to repay an outstanding loan. Goodkat is lurking in the shadows, and police detective Brikowski (Stanley Tucci) tries to untangle all the motives as Slevin seeks to survive the impending mayhem.

Plenty of movies have attempted to recreate the sheer verve of Pulp Fiction; few have succeeded as well as Lucky Number Slevin. This is an in-your-face barely-in-control full throttle thriller, a white knuckle wild ride through the world of crime and punishment.

Combining numerous disparate events that slowly converge into a brilliant whole with a collection of memorable characters, Lucky Number Slevin is an intricate narrative puzzle. The film starts with the pieces all over the place, but writer Jason Smilovic and director Paul McGuigan know exactly where they are heading and how to get there. Every detail matters, and as the picture is assembled the narrative wizardry comes to the fore. Of course the plot holes are there to be picked, but overall the story of vendettas, revenge, goons and rogue assassinations is sly and resplendent.

Stylistically McGuigan deploys typical Tarantinoesque touches, including colourful marginal characters, just about everyone lying about almost everything, occasional philosophizing, brief explosions of violence, and oddities like rivals The Boss and The Rabbi occupying apartments across the street from each other. In relative terms the blood and gore are dialed back, and Lucky Number Slevin revels in the power of a single compact trigger event for all the mayhem.

The cast members stay within themselves and allow the script to star. Josh Hartnett is in the middle of the pandemonium as Slevin, and finds one of his career best fitting roles. Without stretching beyond established personas, Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman and Ben Kingsley offer plenty of weighty veteran talent, all three as men still trading in death when they should know better.

Breezy and fierce in equal measures, Lucky Number Slevin runs the perfect race.

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Movie Review: Payback (1999)

A tongue-in-cheek neo-noir film with a throwback 1970s edge, Payback is a rollicking fun time, filled with sharp dialogue, a smooth anti-hero and jarring violence.

A career criminal known only as Porter (Mel Gibson) has been double crossed, shot and left for dead. With his wife Lynn (Deborah Kara Unger) and partner in crime Val Resnick (Gregg Henry), Porter had just stolen $140,000 from a Chinese gang. But Lynn and Val conspire to relieve Porter of his $70,000 share, with Lynn shooting Porter in the back for good measure, upset that he was having an affair with call girl Rosie (Maria Bello). Val uses most of the money to buy his way back into a powerful criminal organization known as The Outfit, run by Carter (William Devane) and Fairfax (an uncredited James Coburn).

Porter recovers and sets about plotting his revenge with violent methods, demanding the return of his $70,000. Lynn overdoses on heroin, and Porter tracks down Val through drug dealer Stegman (David Paymer). But his exploits attract a crowd, and soon the Chinese gang, including S+M dominatrix Pearl (Lucy Liu) are on his tail, as well as two crooked cops. The closer Porter gets to Val, the more he tangles with the leadership of The Outfit, all the way up to kingpin Bronson (Kris Kristofferson).

Porter, narrating: Crooked cops. Do they come in any other way? If I'd been just a little dumber, I could have joined the force myself.

Directed and co-written by Brian Helgeland, Payback is a gritty, aggressive thriller. With a bad-guy hero carrying a kick-ass, dead-already attitude and Mel Gibson at his absolute cool peak, the film oozes danger with extreme prejudice. The story understandably stretches Porter's capabilities beyond rationality, but otherwise the mix of sardonic humour, punchy action and unconstrained ballsiness among bad guys and worse guys is triumphant.

Carter: There's an old expression that's served me well: "Do not shit where you eat."

A big part of the film's appeal is the investment made in Porter as a character. He is humanized both in his sense of honour among thieves, and through his relationship with Rosie, two flawed sinners drifting sideways until they meet each other. The oily Val Resnick is also provided with plenty of latitude to come to life as the antithesis of Porter, a criminal without scruples just looking for his version of the good life.

Carter, to Resnick: Do you understand your value to the organization, Resnick?...You're a sadist. You lack compunction. That comes in handy.

The everything-including-the-kitchen-sink elements work surprisingly well. Lucy Liu has a blast as the dominatrix turned on by violence; her depraved arousal in bed next to Resnick as he is being threatened by Porter summarizes the film's unconstrained wickedness, culminating in Porter's classic let her work quip. The gun-toting Chinese gang, the crooked cops, and the ever mounting layers of sleaze up the ladder of The Outfit all add to Payback's enjoyable insanity. Veterans William Devane, James Coburn and Kris Kristofferson glide in with mounting levels of evil smarminess.

Pearl, seductively: I've got a few minutes.
Porter: So go boil an egg.

The film's colour palette is a mixture of bleached greys, blacks and browns, appropriate for an underworld rife with backstabbing. Payback goes into the sordid corners of criminality, and lands on a pile of misanthropic revelry.

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Movie Review: Domino (2005)

A case of all style and almost incomprehensible substance, Domino dazzles the senses in a vain attempt to cover up the lack of any meaningful content in the turgid story of a female bounty hunter.

The bloodied but defiant Domino Harvey (Keira Knightley) is being questioned by FBI agent Taryn Mills (Lucy Liu) about a $10 million heist that has gone terribly wrong. Domino recounts her life story. The daughter of actor Laurence Harvey, she was drifting through life until she joined the team of grizzled bounty hunter Ed (Mickey Rourke) and his sidekick Choco (Edgar Ramirez). Domino quickly establishes a reputation as fearless and resourceful and she catches the attention of television producer Mark Heiss (Christopher Walken), who launches a reality show about the bounty hunters despite the objections of Domino's mother Sophie (Jacqueline Bisset).

Ed's main client is bail bondsman Claremont (Delroy Lindo), whose mistress Lateesha (Mo'Nique), an employee of the Department of Motor Vehicles, needs $300,000 for her granddaughter's operation. Claremont concocts a plan to steal $10 million from Las Vegas tycoon Drake Bishop (Dabney Coleman), with the intention of having his squad of bounty hunters "recover" the money in exchange for a $300,000 finders fee. When Lateesha's illicit licensing activities land her in trouble, she unintentionally gets the teenaged children of mob boss Anthony Cigliutti (Stanley Kamel) involved in the heist. Domino and her crew get dropped into a mess of an explosive situation, starting with an armed and bloody standoff at the mobile home of getaway driver Locus Fender and his shotgun-toting mother Edna.

Director Tony Scott starts with the true story of the real Domino Harvey, but uses her only as a loose inspiration. Screenwriter Richard Kelly creates an out of control narrative that tries and fails to emulate Tarantino's intertwining multi-character story construction. Instead Scott allows his worst trickster impulses to take over, resulting in a film that calls attention to its director in every scene. Domino is a land of spaced-out narration, repeated snippets of dialogue, editing that is in turns jarring and dreamy, and vivid green and yellow colours dominating the screen.

The film's visual style is either distractingly overwrought or artistically stunning, but regardless cannot compensate for a story that is a strange mix of ludicrous and vacant. With the cardboard characters offering no wit and eliciting no sympathy, the gory violence and ridiculous shootouts carry no impact. It really does not matter who among the snide collection of lowlifes lives or dies from scene to scene. The entire reality television show sub-plot is a needless exercise in unfunny bloat, and the endlessly hesitant romance between Domino and Choco never gets past the stuttering stage. The complicated heist component of the film then arrives late and starts to veer into unfathomable territory, transforming Domino's 127 minutes of running time into a true endurance test.

Keira Knightley delivers a suitably glum performance, the rich girl who takes up big guns to compensate for an absentee famous daddy. Mickey Rourke is the only cast member trying to inject a human depth to his character, but the script offers him little to work with.

Domino is a jazzy feast for the eyes, but otherwise tumbles with an unseemly clatter.

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The Movies Of Lucy Liu

All movies starring Lucy Liu and reviewed on the Ace Black Movie Blog are linked below:

Jerry Maguire (1996)

Payback (1999)

Charlie's Angels (2000)

Chicago (2002)

Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003)

Kill Bill Vol. 1 (2003)

Kill Bill Vol. 2 (2004)

Domino (2005)

Lucky Number Slevin (2006)

Set It Up (2018)

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The Movie Star Index is here.

Movie Review: Kill Bill Vol. 1 (2003)

The first part of Quentin Tarantino's epic tale of revenge is an astounding achievement. Kill Bill Vol. 1 is a hyperkinetic journey through the craft of modern cinema, Tarantino infusing the film with rampant style to elevate the story of The Bride on a killing mission to beautifully bombastic art.

A deadly woman known only as The Bride (Uma Thurman) is seeking revenge on a band of assassins who used to be her former colleagues, all working for a man known as Bill (David Carradine, never fully seen). The pregnant Bride's wedding was crashed by Bill and the highly-trained killing team of O-Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu), Vernita Green (Vivica A. Fox), Budd (Michael Madsen) and Elle Driver (Daryl Hannah). After killing everyone else in the wedding party, Bill himself shot The Bride in the head and left her for dead.

But she survived, and after emerging from a four-year coma, she escapes from hospital after settling scores with an abusive attendant and embarks on her revenge. Her second revenge killing is chronicled first, and it is a brutal battle with Green in the heart of suburbia. Their fight to the death is interrupted when Green's young daughter Nikki returns from school, but only briefly. Then the focus shifts back in time to The Bride in Japan hunting O-Ren Ishii. A back-story recounting the rise of Ishii to the head of Japan's Yakuza crime syndicate is presented in anime-style. The Bride equips herself with a mythical Hanzo sword and infiltrates a restaurant to attack Ishii and her army of defenders in a monstrously bloody martial arts confrontation.

While the plot of revenge is certainly potent, this is a movie by a movie fan for movie fans. Starting with its title, the film is clear about where it will end. The questions are therefore not about whether The Bride will succeed in earning a confrontation with Bill; rather, the experience is all about how stylishly she will get there. Everything about Kill Bill Vol. 1 is geared towards securing maximum pizazz points, and Tarantino starts by constructing Vol. 1 in a non-linear format, the story of the The Bride bouncing back and forth across time. The transitions are handled with ease, and the structure adds to the film's dynamism.

Combining elements from mythical samurai epics, low-brow kung fu exploitation, Spaghetti Westerns, rape-and-revenge flicks, ultra violent anime movies and gangland thrillers, Tarantino creates a loving homage to the action film. With evocative and powerful music selections borrowed from countless other films propelling the narrative, Kill Bill Vol. 1 is a nitro-fuelled trip.

Tarantino and cinematographer Robert Richardson create masterful images with artistic camera angles, innovative framing, and an expansive, more-is-more approach to film-making. The violence is excessive to the point of grotesque artistry. Blood gushes in rich sprays from severed limbs, sets are covered with dead bodies, and murderous rampages do not even spare the witness of children.

The anime sequence of O-Ren Ishii's story, rising from a child who witnessed her father's murder to the most powerful woman in Japan's underworld, is brilliant, but it is just a prelude. The film ends with The Bride and her Hanzo sword taking on the Crazy 88 gang protecting O-Ren Ishii in an asymmetrical martial arts battle of uniquely wondrous exaggeration, choreographed into an overwhelming battlefield ballet.

Despite the dizzying array of characters, with each having a name and a nickname, Uma Thurman holds the film together in an icy grip of unshakable conviction. Her mix of sexy athleticism and grim determination to kill is spectacular, and she carries the load of The Bride against the world with ridiculous ease.

Kill Bill Vol. 1 is magnificently expansive movie making, Tarantino spreading his wings as an artist through a grand tale of love, betrayal and revenge, celebrating his art form while simultaneously enhancing it with a master's flourish.



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Movie Review: Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003)

While the first episode of the unfortunate Charlie's Angels brand revival was almost tolerable, this truly unnecessary sequel is not. Full Throttle is one tiresome stuntfest, and at 106 minutes, it's about 101 minutes too long.

There is no plot, just a couple of bullet points on a greasy napkin: the Angels need to retrieve two titanium rings that together reveal the identity of every person ever placed in the witness relocation program. Cue contrived action sequences in Mongolia, on the motocross track, at the harbour, and at a Hollywood premiere of a fake movie called Maximum Extreme that sounds awful but still promises to be much better than Full Throttle. There is a minor complication related to one of the Angels revealing herself to be a protected witness originally named Helen Zaas, this being about the beginning and end of the wit on display.

Cameron Diaz, Lucy Liu and Drew Barrymore are back as the Angels, already going through the motions of wiggling their well-toned derrières in between the CGI sequences. Demi Moore is the main villainess, a former Angel gone bad, mainly because she believed herself too good to require teammates, although Moore's main motivation to appear in the film must have been to display her bikini body at age 41.

A parade of supporting performers including John Cleese (wasted), Shia LaBeouf (lost), Matt LeBlanc (clueless), Luke Wilson (ignored), Crispin Glover (underused), Justin Theroux (taking his role way too seriously), and Bernie Mac (as Bosley) get limited screen time in amongst all the computer processing power busy whirling away to create impossible leaps, jumps and somersaults.

The stunts are so over the top that they are much more laughable than thrilling, director McG losing control of the distinction between inspired and insipid, and going all out to prove that more is less.

Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle has the pedal on the floor, but the gear is firmly stuck in reverse.

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Movie Review: Charlie's Angels (2000)

The television series was a showcase for models trying to pretend that they were actresses representing women's emerging empowerment. The movie does away with any pretenses. Essentially a 98 minute music video that finds every excuse to fill the frame with the cleavage, rear-ends, and blowing hair of its leading ladies, Charlie's Angels is almost tolerable mainly because this film is honest about its intentions. Director McG also earns some points for stylish action sequences that effectively use slow-motion to highlight the depth of the stunts in the many one-on-one hand combat scenes.

The plot matters about as much as it would in a slickly produced rock video. Natalie (Cameron Diaz), Dylan (Drew Barrymore), and Alex (Lucy Liu) are detectives working for an agency run by the mysterious and rich Charlie. Their handler and only contact with Charlie is the hapless Bosley (Bill Murray). The Angels are retained by Vivian Wood (Kelly Lynch) to rescue her business partner and software wizard Eric Knox (Sam Rockwell), who has apparently been kidnapped by rival computer magnate Roger Corwin (Tim Curry). But the Angels soon realize that neither Vivian nor Eric are what they seem, and the hunters become the hunted as Charlie himself is threatened with violent and permanent retirement.

Diaz, Barrymore (who also helped to produce the movie) and Liu go through the film with a knowing smile and glint in their eye, confirming that they are not at all taking any of the silliness seriously, and they have fun flirting shamelessly with the cameras. Charlie's Angels hustles along from one contrived set-piece to the next, never losing sight of the prime objective, which is to place the Angels in as many figure-hugging outfits as possible before the bad guys are finally terminated.

Charlie's Angels is the equivalent of browsing a fashion magazine with a model staring out of every page: an icky mixture of the glossy and the vacuous.

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