2015 in review: mission impossible rogue nation and paper towns

Mission Impossible--Rogue Nation: (dir: Christopher McQuarrie) It's partly because I watched it after bingeing on Terriers eps, I know. THAT great writing pointed up the flaws in MI:RN which might possibly have been obscured some had I been watching, you know, Star Trek Next Generation instead. But the flaws are huge! The dialogue is clunky as hell. The humor doesn't work, the interchanges aren't endearing, there is no chemistry between the characters, or, if there was at one time, it is no longer apparent because the conversation is limp and they're all just too exhausted thinking about the action scenes to actually give any thought to the characters. The exposition is long-winded, without panache, and because the things they have to accomplish exist so entirely in a world beyond this one, -- absolutely impossible tasks, seriously, -- it's difficult to invest any care. They're obviously living in a world where the laws of physics are different, so we can just assume everything is going to come out unshrunk from the wash. It's disappointing. And the gizmos, the mechanical whatsits they go up against, the ridiculous technology: one thing Bond films always do is capture the wonderful whimsy of advanced technology, which is entirely lacking here. The mechanical things are, like the rest of the movie, without humor, without caprice, each serving a single plot-point, no more.

And I find it troubling that although the MIF team has found its steadfast crew of dudes (Cruise, Renner, Pegg, Rhames), the chicks still never last past the film at hand. Could it be because men are allowed to age (Cruise, Rhames) and the one crucial aspect of the MIF chick is that she remain young, lithe and gorgeous in addition to retaining her ridiculous levels of toughness and agility? Rhames is even allowed to get winded during a chase scene. The chick (Rebecca Ferguson, whom I liked, very much), however, is required to be superhuman and completely inappropriately dressed while she's doing it. Seriously? She wears a single, slinky, yellow-as-hell piece of satin cut all the way up to her midriff? This is what she wears when she's infiltrating the Vienna Opera to take out the Prime Minister? This is how one blends in, avoids drawing attention? This is the kind of nonsense this movie calls sense. Bond films do it whimsically, so it works (sometimes). This movie does it woodenly, humorlessly, without heart, without soul. I was truly sorry I spent the time watching it.

IN SUMMARY: I found no joy here. Except in the use of the "Nessun Dorma". That was nice.

*SPOILER ALERT*

Paper Towns: (dir: Jake Schreier) You know this one. It's the coming-of-age, end-of-high-school movie narrated by Dweeby Everykid (this one more boring than most) in sardonic tones, detailing his true love for the perfect beauty who lives across the street. She is Mystery, probably symbolizing The Eternal Feminine; she emits enigmatic utterances and flirts just enough to keep him entangled. Although they must separate (because if he settled down with her, she would cease to be Mystery and become a human being), she brings him, for the first time, fully to life with the breath of her magical anima-energy.

One of his two best friends wants very much to be the young John Cusack and really, really isn't. Regardless, all three of these dweeb-masters will, by the end of the movie, wind up within kissing range of the three hottest girls in school. Just like in real life. The movie ends with the three of them parting, sweetly nostalgic, to head into their shiny, shiny futures.

IN SUMMARY: It was five hours long. Or, if it wasn't, it sure as hell felt like it.