The dog days of the summer of 2015 are crawling to a close, and it’s time to take a look at the July/August offerings.
Ever since The Fugitive opened big and earned critical raves at the end of summer 1993, the first weekend in August has become the last-chance platform for summertime tent-pole films—this year, Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation filled this slot handsomely; more on M:I-5 below—but beyond the hyped early-August blockbuster, the final weeks of summer are typically chock full of lesser known and lesser quality films that the studios fling to the wall, hoping something sticks.
This year has been no exception, though it’s a bit of a surprise to recognize just how abominable some of the dogs turned out to be.
The transition from July to August brought about new entries in two decades-old film franchises. Vacation (the “National Lampoon” attribution is conspicuously long gone) is less a reboot of the 1983 original than a sequel, if only for the continuity of featuring a grown-up Rusty Griswold (Ed Helms) try his hand at a Wally World family vacation, plus a glorified cameo by original Clark W. Griswold, immortalized by Chevy Chase.
I salute the producers’ bravery in taking the rated-R route like the original (all three previous Vacation sequels are tamer PG-13- and PG-rated trifles), though the filmmakers were clearly attempting to mimic the bawdy hijinks of the recent road-trip hit We’re the Millers. No amount of crass gross-out humor could surpass the beloved original which, lest we forget, was written by the late great John Hughes and directed by the late great Harold Ramis.
As with practically every other movie nowadays, the studio was banking on a re-launch of the franchise, but paltry box office returns and a dismal 26% Rotten Tomato aggregate rating suggest this particular Vacation is over.
Faring better than the latest Griswold opus, Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation marks the fifth outing for Tom Cruise as IMF agent Ethan Hunt. It took the filmmakers four films to perfect the balance of nail-biting suspense, breakneck action, exotic locales and humorous camaraderie in 2011’s Ghost Protocol, and even after a nearly four-year gap between films, it feels like the makers of M:I-5 haven’t skipped a beat.
The film never attains the same dizzying heights of inventive fun as M:I-4, but it does feature a spotlight role for Rebecca Ferguson, who steals the show as a mysterious double agent. Ferguson handily silences critics who say the women in this franchise are merely window dressing (for the record, I also thought Paula Patton was smashingly good in M:I-4). As illustrated in a slam-bang opener during which Cruise hangs onto the side of an airborne plane, M:I-5 boasts some sensational practical stunt work, yet there is noticeably a bit too much reliance on CGI elsewhere.
None of the digital embellishments are of the Indy 4 “nuke the fridge” variety, but they’re distracting enough to stick out like a sore thumb in a series that prides itself on doing things real-for-real. The solid global performance of M:I-5 is proof that Tom Cruise is still very much a box office draw, and it’s no surprise that M:I-6 has just been announced and will film next summer—though Mr. Cruise will be hard-pressed to outdo himself in the real-for-real action department.
The second weekend of August brought about the long-dreaded reboot of Fantastic Four, which turned out to be as dull and dour as fan-boys had feared.
With its darker tone and reports of a troubled production and panicked reshoots, expectations were low to say the least. It wouldn’t have taken much effort to best the pair of corny and clunky Fantastic Four films from Tim Story in 2005 and 2007, but when the abysmal reviews started trickling in (a stunning, embarrassing 8% on Rotten Tomatoes) and then the new movie’s young director trashed the film and the studio with a scathing tweet on the eve of its premiere, the project was deemed dead on arrival. Though nobody seems to want it, Fox is reportedly plowing forth on a sequel to this failed reboot, with the apparent aim of retaining the rights solely to prevent Disney/Marvel from reacquiring them (and, no doubt, finally doing the source material proper justice).
Also appearing in August was the psychological thriller The Gift. This low-key tale of a vengeful weirdo loner (played by Joel Edgerton, making his writer/directorial debut) has been done to death before, and done much better to boot—see: Single White Female; Unlawful Entry; The Cable Guy; etcetera.
The atmosphere is appropriately creepy, there is some fetching widescreen cinematography, and Jason Bateman acquits himself in a role not reliant on his sarcastic charm, but I’m still scratching my head over the movie’s Rotten Tomato aggregate of 92%—a mere tick under M:I-5 and only a few notches below such instant and indisputable classics as Inside Out and Mad Max: Fury Road.
Next to arrive was Guy Ritchie’s stylish but surprisingly tedious update of the 1960s television spy series The Man from U.N.C.L.E. It was good enough for late summer fare, but not quite good enough to launch a franchise. Indeed, I’d much rather have seen Ritchie make a third Sherlock Holmes movie with Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law.
Leading man Henry Cavill may make for a serviceable Man of Steel, but I strain to think of any other contemporary actor who has ridden so far on chiseled good looks while exuding so little onscreen charisma. Co-star Armie Hammer fares better: he’s at least likable, but his performance is hindered by a fluctuating Russian accent.
Two stunningly beautiful actresses help make up for the lack of sparks between the two male leads, with Elizabeth Debicki delivering a deliciously devilish turn as the femme fatale. Great location photography, fabulous period costumes, a terrific musical score and a humorous extended cameo by Hugh Grant do all of the heavy lifting here, but it’s a safe bet we won’t be seeing a big-screen Return of the Man from U.N.C.L.E., like ever.
Next up, Straight Outta Compton is the true ’80s-era tale of the birth of hip-hop.
Thanks to a ubiquitous meme campaign, everybody and their uncle was straight outta patience for all things straight outta somewhere even before the movie dropped. Nevertheless, the film opened to stellar business and solid reviews, and has quickly become one of the biggest success stories of the summer.
The final weeks of August are when the dregs predictably flood into theaters, and it’s during these last weekends of summertime when the system of aggregating critical reviews into a Rotten Tomato percentage becomes something of a blood sport—we’re (not) looking at you, Hitman: Agent 47 (7%), Fantastic Four (8%), Sinister 2 (12%), and July’s Pixels (16%). Notably, single-digit Rotten Tomato ratings are rare and have an inherent curiosity factor—can a movie truly be that horrible?—but even the promise of an air-conditioned theater isn’t enough to lure audiences out of the heat for these dogs.
As autumn approaches and the weather cools, several exciting projects are waiting to reaffirm our faith in the movies.
Before the season is over, we’ll see the return of M. Night Shyamalan with a twisted suspense thriller (The Visit, opening September 11); an all-star true-story gangster drama starring Johnny Depp (Black Mass, September 18), a new sci-fi project from Ridley Scott (The Martian, October 2); the Danny Boyle/Aaron Sorkin collaboration about the late Steve Jobs (appropriately titled Steve Jobs, October 9); a gothic rated-R horror show from Guillermo del Toro (Crimson Peak, October 16); a new James Bond adventure (SPECTRE, November 6); the conclusion of the Hunger Games “trilogy” (Mockingjay – Part II, November 20); and—hallelujah!— a new entry in the Star Wars saga (Episode VII: The Force Awakens, December 18).
May all of these films deliver on their considerable promise.
