The Shape of Water (2017)

"Unable to perceive the shape of you, I find you all around me.

Your presence fills my eyes with your love, 

it humbles my heart,for you are everywhere."

The Shape of Water is beautiful, touching, and celebrates the power of cinema while satirizing its oldest, most toxic tropes. Writer/director Guillermo del Toro's films are often visually spectacular, but The Shape of Water is one of his more thoughtful films (I haven't seen Pan Labyrinth, and yes, I know that makes me a horrible person). Dealing with themes of racism and the nature of social outcasts desperate for affection, The Shape of Water is sweetly romantic and hard-edged in all the best ways. The cast is stellar, the production design shines, and the story is full of unexpected little moments. It honestly has all the makings of a modern classic, and while the film's elevator pitch might sound off putting (what if the woman who always gets abducted by the Creature from the Black lagoon was... you know... into it?), it never feels like erotic Creature from the Black Lagoon fan fiction (even though it totally is, and I'm just fine with that).

The story follows Elisa (Sally Hawkins), a mute woman living in Baltimore in the early 1960s. Racial tensions are high and Cold War paranoia runs rampant around the country and at the government facility where she works as a janitor. Her African-American co-worker Zelda (Octavia Spencer) and her gay neighbor Giles (Richard Jenkins) are her closest friends, but romantically, she is alone and desperate for sexual affection. She also really likes hard boiled eggs and sweeping Hollywood movies. One day at the facility, Elisa discovers a half-man/half-fish creature captured from South America by Colonel Richard Strickland (Michael Shannon). Elisa and the Creature form a loving bond, and before Strickland and a scientist named Robert Hoffstetler (Michael Stuhlbarg) have the chance to dissect and kill the creature, Elisa devises a plot to break him out.

The Shape of Water is simultaneously a celebration and a satire of Old Hollywood, incorporating and subverting the tropes of sci-fi, horror, and musicals of the time ( Elisa even lives above a movie theater, if you needed any doubts). When del Toro saw The Creature from the Black Lagoon as a boy, he wanted to see a successful romance between the Creature and the woman he loves. You can see why one could argue for this being Del Toro's excuse to make erotic monster fan fiction, because Elisa's affection for the monster (and his for her) are explicitly sexual in nature. But the film has a sweet center, and Elisa is a wonderfully-realized character (no small writing feat when she can't speak). While the film is not a direct tie-in the Universal series, foreknowledge of how the original stories go is beneficial: the slimy, aquatic monster from South America falls in love (or is just attracted to) a woman, who he promptly tries to abduct. She must be saved by the handsome white man, and the monster can be killed like all outcasts should. That's the most cynical reading of the plot I could muster, and none of that mean-spirited attitude is present in The Shape of Water. You should only satirize the things you love, and it's del Toro's love for the classics that allows him to so deftly turn their cliches on their heads.

Take the Strickland, for instance, who is the film's ostensible villain. He's the very essence of the white, heteronormative, successful family man, but he's faced with characters and situations that challenge his status as "the norm." He's all the things that make up the bland "heroes" of the films of the 1950s and early '60s, but as the film progresses, this clean facade breaks down to reveal a character defined by toxic masculinity, bloodthirstiness, materialism, and a superiority complex. The way he treats the creature, Zelda, and the intellectuals he works with make him despicable, and all his actions are justified by the Red Scare and the ideals of the time. None of this is done with much subtlety when it comes to some of the scripting (and lack of nuance tends to hold the film back in other areas as well), but Strickland and every major character are still complex and richly defined.

The cast is uniformly excellent. Besides Hawkins and Shannon, both giving extraordinary performances, we have Octavia Spencer charming us to death with her humor and emotion and Richard Jenkins doing the same. Both are playing characters who are societal outcasts like Elisa and the Creature, and who have to step up to be more than society tells them they can be. Their stories function as a parallel to the unusual romance that takes center stage. It helps that they have wonderful dialogue written by del Toro himself and Vanessa Taylor, which exhibits wit and earnestness that never leans too saccharine or too cynical. The film has a light heart most of the time, but the way the actors react to some of the darker moments really sells the danger, and even though the stakes are relatively small when we hit the climax, we care a hell of a lot.

Brining The Shape of Water up another level are its lovely technical accomplishments. Del Toro's film are often known for their visual splendors (in some cases, that's all they have going for them), but the production design, music, and cinematography give the film the feeling of a modern fairy tale for adults. There are oddly fitting (and unmistakably) French touches, like Alexandre Desplat's score, the casual use of nudity and sex, and the layer of romance applied to the whole bizarre situation. The characters and situations are rooted in reality, but Paul Austerberry's production design whisks us away to a mythical land defined by art deco and steampunk. The use of shots through water and underwater are also quite beautiful, and left me with more than a few instantly iconic images.The Creature itself, played by the brilliant Doug Jones, is brought to life via suit and make-up techniques and the results are absolutely breathtaking. While I believe CGI was applied to his eyes to give them more animation, the majority of his effects (including bioluminescence and gills that move on their own) are done in-camera. His design exhibits just enough handsome, human-like traits that you can buy into Elisa's attraction to him, and while I would have liked the film to explore his personality a bit more, their relationship is very winning.

The social commentary, the Hollywood sendups and homages, and the outstanding performances are all just dressing on a film that truly thrives because of its enormous heart. Speaking as a gay man, it can be difficult to find relatable love stories in Hollywood films, but The Shape of Water seems designed to appeal to the misfits and the outsiders; to the old-fashioned romantics as well as the trailblazers. It may very well be a groundbreaking film for the genre (whichever one you decide to slot it into), and I'd even say that it's an important one. It may be a bit on-the-nose with some of its ideas, and it covers a hell of a lot of ground, but its artistic merits are damn near transcendent.

9/10

Redline (2009)

Someone's having doubts, huh? 
Hell, I was just trying to keep this thing interesting. 

You're just a voice, pal! You don't know a damn thing about racing!

Japanese animation is and its permeation of American culture has always fascinated me. While I admit to only seeking out a handful of anime shows and films per year, the ones I discover tend to blow me away. This past year I discovered Redline, a magnificently drawn, exhilarating thrillride of a movie that deserves more attention in the animation-loving world. Make no mistake, the film is all style and very little substance. But what glorious style it has! The film is a sci-fi lover's dream come true, with imaginative alien designs, grittily-detailed worlds, and an incredible soundtrack that matches the film's exciting speed and video game-like sense of fun. In fact, it might be apt to compare Redline to a video game, because it exists as an experience, not so much as a coherent story with compelling character arcs. The film introduces us to many potentially great characters, but their stories feel somewhat incomplete.

In the far future, human beings and aliens alike compete in elaborate and dangerous races in high-tech cars, flying vehicles, and even transforming robots. A human with an impractically large pompadour named "Sweet" JP (Takuya Kimura, Patrick Seitz in the dub) barely makes it to the finish during the Yellowline race, which is a sort of a preliminary for the galaxy's most popular race, the Redline (I can only assume there were other color-lined races were before this, but we'll get to world-building problems later). Among the other contenders is a human named Sonoshee "Cherry Boy Hunter" McLaren (Yu Aoi, Michelle Ruff in the dub) who has been determined to win the Redline race her whole life. The race will take place on Roboworld against the wishes of its President (Kosei Hirota, David Lodge in the dub). The inhabitants of Roboworld are militant cyborgs who view the race as a plague upon society, and warn that they will kill the racers if they choose to continue. That's not stopping the contestants, who are primed to race no matter what. Among the racers gathered on Roboworld are a couple of bounty hunters, an insanely strong cyborg, some overly-sexualized pop stars, and blue gorilla-like alien cop. Meanwhile, JP's alien best friend and mechanic Frisbee (Tadanobu Asano, Liam O-Brien in the dub) is concerned with fixing the race for a mafia boss, to whom he owes money of course.

There are plenty of great ideas here to bolster the story, and the ensemble cast of characters are very well-established, but Redline isn't ultimately throws away a lot of potential. Little Deyzuna (Kenta Miyake, Derek Stephen Prince in the dub) is a highly emotional cyborg who joins the race to get back at his old comrade, who apparently left him behind during a war. He is consequently my favorite character; everything from his design to his personality to his tragic backstory begs for more details and more time given to the character's resolution, and a short epilogue might have been able to address this. Sadly, the film stops dead when the race ends. In fact, hardly any of the potential story points planted throughout the film have any kind of solid payoff, and the only resolution we do get is a half-baked love story that had hardly buildup. The ending is very frustrating because the characters really are fantastic, but as-presented, each is sadly one-dimensional (save perhaps for Sonoshee and Frisbee).

Problems with worldbuilding start from the ground up; is this an underground race or is it widely celebrated? The Roboworld president declares it illegal, but what power does he really have? The race is broadcast all over the galaxy, and people aspire to be in it, so is Roboworld the only place that has a problem with it? If so, why in the world would you have the race there?  And seriously, what was with the big, blobby, energy baby Funky Boy? Rather than smiling with glee at the madness just witnessed, I was left pondering these questions and wishing I'd gotten more development out of the ensemble cast. I also can't decide if Redline's portrayal of women is self-conscious and satirical in its over-sexualized nature or if fanservice is supposed to be just that (I'd like to think that BoiBoi and BosBos are parodies of sexualized anime women, but at one point, Sonoshee is topless watching them on TV, so who knows?).  In a lesser film, these issues might be deal-breakers, but here they're merely speedbumps. This isn't a political thriller, it's nothing but a sci-fi racing movie with some of the best racing scenes ever committed to the screen (my thirst for a deeper story be damned).

The aesthetics do a lot of the heavy lifting here, and the races really are the stuff of legend. Director Takeshi Koike brings everything to life with a heavy emphasis on hand-drawn animation; the vehicles, explosions, moving backgrounds, speed warping, etc. are all lovingly crafted and fluid, accentuated by pitch black shading that resembles the art of a graphic novel. In fact, much of Redline resembles a moving graphic novel, with its wonderfully-detailed characters and sharp, stylish backgrounds. I can't even begin to describe the amazing designs of the hundreds of aliens and cyborgs seen throughout the movie, which range from charming to disgusting to just plain adorable. There are things done here that CGI wouldn't be able to replicate, like JP's car warping when he fires off a speed boost, or a strange cutaway to a family of aliens watching TV that's drawn in a wildly different art style. Since the animation was handled by studio Madhouse (which also produced the incredible Paprika), I'd expect nothing less. Even when the film borders on sensory overload, the sense of excitement is never lost.

The large majority of Redline is incredible to look at, but also to listen to. The music by James Shimoji is pulse-pounding and intense, but oddly beautiful at the same time. It matches the gorgeous animation flawlessly, and incorporates hilarious little "theme songs" for most of the racers that are charming and fun (and helps to make up for their lack of character development). I watched the film in its original Japanese audio and the American dub, and the dub did it justice. It is, of course, incredibly sad that in the eight or so years since its release that it didn't inspire any other projects to follow in its hand-drawn footsteps (though its seven-year-long production and poor box office performance were likely not encouraging factors). Nonetheless, I'm grateful that it exists and that it seems to be gaining a small cult audience. I've said this before about my personal relationship with the Disney films of the 70s and 80s, but if there's one good thing that's come from the CGI overload we face from modern animated American films (and the ever-increasing digitalization of Japanese anime), it's that it forces us to look to the past for gems we might have missed. Redline is assuredly one of those gems.

7/10

Batman and Harley Quinn (2017)

God help us

As an avid fan of the DC Animated Universe television shows, I was beyond excited when I saw that a new animated movie was coming out in its continuity. For the laymen in the audience, the DCAU consists of seven distinct series featuring the DC Comics superheroes, including Batman, Superman, the Justice League, and a few original characters. This fourteen-year-long series features some of the best screen versions of these characters, and the very fact that Batman and Harley Quinn exists is evidence of how beloved they still are today. Of course, whether the actual film in question is hard cannon is thankfully debatable, and I do mean thankfully; for if Batman and Harley Quinn does take place in the DCAU, then it's surely the lowest point of the entire franchise. What should have been a fun and breezy action comedy is nothing more than a dull, sleazy cartoon made for God only knows who. Despite being conceived by Bruce Timm (the architect behind the DCAU), the film's tone and sense of humor couldn't be further from the witty and sophisticated nature of the family-oriented shows that draws from. There are bright spots throughout throughout the film's scant hour and fifteen minutes, and I'll admit to laughing at quite a few in-jokes, but there are just too many insulting moments and ill-conceived concepts to declare the whole project as anything but a disappointing misfire.

We arrive in Gotham City, where Poison Ivy (Paget Brewster) and a plant-person called the Floronic Man (Kevin Michael Richardson) have teamed up to try and replicate the accident that created Swamp Thing (John DiMaggio), a different plant-person who was mutated after being doused in burning chemicals and jumping into a swamp. If they succeed, Poison Ivy and Floronic Man could contaminate the Earth's water supply and turn everyone into plant people, which in their twisted minds means saving the planet. Batman (Kevin Conroy) and former the Robin, Nightwing (Loren Lester), need help from the Joker's ex-sidekick and Poison Ivy's best friend Harley Quinn (Melissa Rauch) in order to find out where the evil duo are conducting their experiments. Harley seems to have changed her ways somewhat, trying to make ends meet by working in a Hooters-like restaurant where the women dress up as scantily-clad versions of female superheroes. She's reluctant to help Batman and Nightwing, but after realizing that Ivy's plan has the potential to kill every living thing on the planet, she agrees to help. Non-sequiturs ensue, including a trip to an evil henchmen-filled karaoke bar, leading to laughs and criginess along the way.

Right off the bat, the film's first misstep is Melissa Rauch replacing Arleen Sorkin as Harley Quinn. Her performance isn't necessarily bad, but it just does not suit the character. Tara Strong did well in the Arkham video game series, so I need to wonder why she couldn't voice her here. This is only worsened by how wonderful it is that the rest of the main characters are all voiced by their respective original actors (especially Loren Lester as Nightwing, who might just be the best he's ever been in the role). To a lesser extent, Kevin Michael Richardson is also miscast as the Floronic Man. Richardson is one of the all-time great voice actors (most well-known as Gantu from Lilo and Stitch), but there's a disconnect between the voice and face here that's hard to describe.

The second, and much more damning misstep, was the decision to go PG-13 with the content for the sake of it, not because the story would benefit from it. Sometimes restraint breeds greater creativity, and Bruce Timm and co-writer Jim Krieg were clearly given loose reigns when conceiving this film. It feels as though certain elements are there to show off the fact that this isn't airing on a kids' network, and that it's for "adults." Look! Harley's exposing her ass to Nightwing, who she's tied to a bed in quite the compromising position! Harley's shaking her tits around in the karaoke bar and constantly bending over seductively! FART JOKES! It's all in bad taste, and manifests as something like a male gaze-fueled fantasy featuring a hollowed-out version of one of the most beloved DC characters of all time. The DCAU is widely loved for pushing the boundaries of what was acceptable for an all-ages animated series (subtle innuendo, harder violence), but in trying to be more mature, this project is irritatingly immature.

The rather silly story could have worked to the film's benefit, but the horrendous pacing and B-grade animation quality only serve to make the film more boring than anything. Opening dialogue between Batman and a government agent is brutally stiff and unimaginatively staged, action throughout is fairly basic and packs little punch (despite some effective use of blood), and the occasional CGI is obtrusive. There's a nice moment where the original Batman theme music plays while the Batplane soars through the sky, but it's sullied by a bad 3D model of and jarring motion. The designs, however, are an absolute joy to see, especially when it comes to the henchmen karaoke bar scene. Gotham looks and feels like it did in the later episodes of the series, and just being back for the first time in eleven years was personally very rewarding.  However, that pacing really kills the mood; I'm talking about a film that spends two entire song's worth of time in that karaoke bar where little of consequence happens, but then it doesn't even bother to show its climax. Certain elements like Harley and Ivy's friendship, Batman helping Harley get a new job, and Nightwing and Harley's possible romantic relationship are all dropped with absolutely no resolution.

Now, let's get to those bright spots already. The "let's push the limits" jokes may tend to fall flat, but the in-jokes for DCAU fans are downright hilarious. A joke about Nightwing's horrible mullet from the series, a vocal cameo from one of the Justice League Unlimited members, and the expansion of the world by including Swamp Thing are just some of the better ideas thrown into this slog. There's also a really clever reference to Seduction of the Innocent, a real-world book that nearly ruined the comics industry in the 1950s. The Harley and Ivy friendship also works pretty well too, which is a shame since it gets pushed so far into the background. There's also an amusing post-credit scene I almost missed, which is ends the film on a much higher note, and sometimes you get those glimpses of the original magic of the series. I just wanted to see more.

I desperately wanted to like Batman and Harley Quinn, but it does so much disservice to fans of the original series and doesn't offer anything good enough to let it stand on its own. It's sloppily written, dull, and sleazy in equal measure, and only offers moments of fun to make it watchable at all. The voice cast gives it their all, but without the great Andrea Romano's guiding directorial hand, there's nothing special about the performances. I love that the character designs were painstakingly recreated, and character and action animation is fine. However, episodes of Justice League from fifteen years ago look better. It's been said in interviews that Warner Bros. was only interested in doing this movie because Harley Quinn was featured prominently in the live-action Suicide Squad movie, designed to ride that wave of popularity. If that's what caused the resulting attitude shift in Harley's character, then I still have faith that Bruce Timm could make another, much better, continuation of the DCAU. But if this is what he thinks fans want, maybe it's best to let it live in the past, and I suppose that's alright too.

3/10