New at BOP: Review: Matrix Resurrections Movie Review: Moonfall Movie Reviews: Scream The #1 Movie in America November Forecast The Many Saints of Newark October Forecast New Trivia Question All site updates Share & Save   Tweet Print this column

But still, Langdon once again takes a back seat for the penultimate climax, five minutes of soaring insanity, so expertly delivered, that I half -hoped the film might just end there (alas, there are 20 more minutes.) Without belaboring a buildup, this scene involves a recently branded - as in hot metal on flesh - man of the cloth, played by Ewan McGregor, piloting a helicopter up into the heavens with a mass of unstable anti-matter in a container by his side. The payoff to this suicidal act of hubris is a stunning panorama of the apocalypse-as-rebirth and the unforgettable image of McGregor parachuting back down to Earth, as if banished from entering the pearly gates forever. McGregor magnificently underplays his role throughout - is he a villain, a devout religious figure, or a forward thinker too progressive for his own good? - yet he can’t entirely hide the twinkle in his eye in the process.

With the controversy that helped propel The Da Vinci Code absent this time around (The Vatican even weighed in favorably on the film’s entertainment value though they did not allow production to take place in Vatican City) Angels & Demons opened with two-thirds of the first film’s take ($45 million) and wound up at about the same ratio for its $133 million final domestic total. International receipts were down equivalently as well.

Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian is a regrettably lackluster and clunky moniker for a sequel that outshines its predecessor for the first two-thirds of its running time. In theory, it should be a poster child for perfunctory and needless sequels. To prove this point, it is the final 30 minutes - when it finally comes time to conventionally wrap up the plot via a frantic pitched battle between the good guys and the bad guys - that the film tips its hand and reveals the limitations of its formula by settling for the Bigger and Louder is Better theory of action climaxes. Until then, Smithsonian seems invigorated with its new setting, more willing to allow its comedic cast to go off on ridiculous (though PG-appropriate) tangents and a lot more relaxed than a $150 million dollar feature has any right to be.

After being granted permission as the first feature film to tie into the Smithsonian extensively and with their blessing, director Shawn Levy and writers Thomas Lennon & Ben Garant allowed their imaginations carte blanche to consider what if all the items therein - including paintings, merchandising, and pop culture icons - became animate? Levy smartly keeps a lot of the mayhem in the background early on or tosses off some characters and moments that wouldn’t have worked if shoehorned in more prominently (a good example is the brief cameo by a Degas ballerina.) Gervais, Wilson, Williams, and Coogan all return and have more amusing “bits of business” in their roles even though total on-screen time is reduced. Stiller’s tussle with fellow security guard Jonah Hill would be cringe-inducing and grind the film to a halt if not for the deft comic timing on both their parts.

Still, in this man’s, man’s, man’s, man’s world, it is Amy Adams who accounts for a fair portion of the film’s joie de vivre with her slang-spewing, breathless, (and no doubt revisionist) take on aviator Amelia Earhart, who sees a chance for some adventure and intrigue with Larry and comes along for the ride. Adams has the market cornered on wide-eyed innocence, but always finds subtle variations within to keep from too easily being pegged as a one-note actress. Her Amelia is equal parts bravado and brains and Adams finds a way to push this self-assurance towards larger-than-life comic territory without slipping into caricature. Plus, I could listen to her say “moxie” and “jimmy-jacked” for hours on end.

Without the two weeks of December and January holidays to help pump up its grosses, Smithsonian didn’t have much of a shot of matching the $250 million-plus number put up by the first film. It did parlay its Memorial Day weekend four-day total of $70 million into an okay final total of $177 million. My guess is the proposed part three will get bumped back to the Christmas season.

It is now five hours into the official start of fall as I wind up this week’s column. This week’s Chapter Twos were originally viewed back to back on July 28, 2009 at the Avalon Theater inside the Wunderland Arcade in SE Portland. This is Brett Beach signing off and saying, “It’s good to be back.”

Next column: Peter Falk plays himself playing an angel (for the second time), Willem Dafoe plays Emit Flesti. Lou Reed and Mikhail Gorbachev appear as themselves. Just your typical Hollywood sequel, in other words.

Continued:       1       2       3       4       5