The Wolverine

Cast: Hugh Jackman, Tao Okamoto, Famke Janssen, Hiroyuki Sanada, Rila Fukushima, Hal Yamanouchi, Svetlana Khodchenkova, Will Yun Lee

Direction: James Mangold

Genre: Adventure

Duration: 2 hours 17 minutes

Story: The Wolverine/Logan is summoned to Japan to meet an old friend whose life he had saved in Nagasaki, during World War 2. On his deathbed, the man (now a billionaire industrialist) wants to return the favor to Logan. However, the latter is drawn into a conflict that is as much about confronting his demons as it is a fight for survival.

Movie Review: Some of the Wolverine's (Jackman) instinctual qualities include being able to sniff out danger. So, when Yukio (Fukushima) tracks down Logan and brings him to Yashida (Yamanouchi), Logan senses something wrong. He is angered by the deal Yashida suggests and plans to leave Japan.

But then, he encounters Yashida's sexy granddaughter Mariko ( Tao Okamoto) who immediately appeals to another set of Logan's instincts. Yashida's death leads to a battle for his fortune and various bad guys make a beeline to kill Mariko because she has been appointed sole heiress. The Wolverine becomes her guardian (and more) and Yukio (Mariko's childhood pal) becomes Wolverine's 'bodyguard'.
This is when director Mangold takes a deep dip into various Japanese themes. Ninjas, modern-day Yakuza, themes of loyalty, honour and even Shinto references are visited here. The Japanese setting - bright lights, big city as well as rural outskirts - is delightful.
On the run, Wolverine is attracted to Mariko's unflappable calm and strength as much as she is to his bravery and courage. He sometimes hallucinates about Jean Grey (Janssen) who was the love of his life, even while in bed with Mariko. So, you have old love versus new love too. Also after them is the venom-spitting Viper (Khodchenkova) in a green bodysuit who takes the femme fatale bit too far.
There are superhero movies with better gags and then there are superhero films with more effects. Eschewing any of those in excess, what this film also offers is soul, pathos and a pretty good look at the multifaceted character that is The Wolverine.

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The Lone Ranger 2013

Cast: Johnny Depp, Armie Hammer, Helena Bonham Carter, Tom Wilkinson,William Fichtner, Ruth Wilson

Direction: Gore Verbinski

Genre: Action

Duration: 2 hours 29 minutes

Story: The Lone Ranger's fable is told from the Native American warrior Tonto's perspective, in a tale where Texas Ranger, John Reid, and he team up to take revenge on a common enemy.

Movie Review: You've seen Johnny Depp playing a sozzled, swaying pirate with the luck of the devil by his side. Now, here's Depp, sans the sauce and in Native American garb as Tonto, with the devil-may-care attitude still in place.

A group of Rangers are sent to capture Cavendish (Fichtner) hiding out in the mountains. However, they are ambushed by Cavendish and his men and gunned down from high ground, like fish in a barrel. Cavendish brutally cuts out Reid's (Hammer) brother's heart while the latter is still alive and eats it. The rest are left for the vultures. Reid is reluctantly rescued from the jaws of death in the unforgiving Texas desert by Tonto, who calls him a "weak, paleface wetbrain".

Tonto loathes the savage greed of the 'palefaces' for having wiped out his entire tribe. They partner against a common foe, with different methods of meting out justice. Along the way, there are many campfire-quality tales of how the West was won and at what cost and sacrifice. There are moving moments - villages wiped out for pieces of silver. The other 'moving' moments, however, happen at breakneck speed, with thundering locomotives set on a collision course in a satisfying climax. The old theme music fits perfectly in that scene, where the action is timed down to the split second.

The characters in the film read like a rustic country song. Carter plays a bar-room queen with a carved ivory leg. There are brigands who swill rotgut like water. An 'origin tale', the visuals show great attention to detail and Depp's Tonto is, without a doubt, the best thing about this movie. In fact, it is Reid who is Tonto's sidekick here.

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Red 2

Cast: Bruce Willis, John Malkovich, Anthony Hopkins, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Mary-Louise Parker, Helen Mirren, Byung-hun Lee

Direction: Dean Parisot

Genre: Action

Duration: 1 hour 56 minutes

Story: Retired black-ops CIA agent Frank Moses teams up with his fellow agents in a quest to locate a missing and deadly nuclear device.

Movie Review: The idea of retired CIA operatives (read: killers) being pressed back into service in the face of mortal danger isn't new. In this case, the fun lies in the execution. And with the kind of multifaceted cast that this film has, there's bound to be some surprises. Frank (Willis) has settled down with Sarah ( Mary-Louise Parker, from the first part of *Red*) into a somewhat humdrum routine. It turns out that Frank and his former eccentric and intelligent partner Marvin Boggs (Malkovich, excellent) helped smuggle a nuclear device called 'Nightshade' (a metal briefcase containing a nuclear bomb) into Russia during the Cold War. Boggs subsequently faked his own death to get off the espionage radar, until the present day. The US government decides that they want the device and declare Boggs, Frank and Sarah to be terrorists. And so, the chase begins. 

Russian agent Katja (Zeta-Jones), who also happens to be Frank's past paramour, is after Nightshade too. The Pentagon enlists MI6 agent Victoria ( Helen Mirren) and hit-man Han Cho Bai ( Byung-hun Lee) to locate them. It turns into a pan-European chase. Only Edward Bailey (Hopkins, totally on point), the scientist who created Nightshade, can help them find it. Juxtaposed in the midst of all this action are Frank and Sarah's relationship issues. 

And even in the midst of all the action, there's never a missed opportunity for the couple to receive relationship advice from anyone, be it the bumbling Boggs, Han of the furious fisticuffs or even cold-blooded Victoria. There are some tantalizing twists and turns that keep you looking forward to what happens next. Willis does his action-comedy routine adroitly. With nicely-timed sequences stitched together and gags galore, the humour in the film positively crackles! Or, as Bailey often says, "Jolly good!

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Pacific Rim

Cast: Charlie Hunnam, Idris Elba, Charlie Day, Rinko Kikuchi, Ron Perlman, Burn Gorman

Direction: Guillermo del Toro

Genre: Action

Duration: 2 hours 11 minutes

Story: Intergalactic monsters called the Kaiju are unleashed from a rift in the Pacific Ocean to wipe out humanity. Only a force of equally gigantic robots created by man called the Jaegers can thwart them.

Review: Stripped down, this movie is essentially about giant robots and giant sea monsters bashing each other up. The Jaeger robots are so large that they require two human operators to form a 'drift' (or a 'neural bridge') with each other to act as the left-brain and right-brain hemispheres controlling the mecha-robots from within. The Jaegers are then airlifted out to sea for a supersized slugfest with the Kaiju. Raleigh Becket ( Charlie Hunnam) had lost his brother Yancy (Diego Klattenhoff) to the Kaiju and the neural bridge allowed Becket to feel his co-driver brother's pain in his time of dying.

Commanding officer Stacker Pentecost ( Idris Elba) later plans a last-ditch effort to knock out the Kaiju once and for all at their source point. Burned-out Becket is recalled into service to command his old Jaeger called Gipsy Danger with Mako Mori (Kikuchi). Mori's own need for revenge against the Kaiju is convincing. She is perfect for her role. Other than that, Del Toro has populated their fellow Jaeger combatants with stereotypes - stoic Russians, bellicose Australians, soft-spoken Orientals and two mad scientists who seek a cerebral solution.

The visuals are undeniably great and so are the effects. You'll even get to see a Jaeger bludgeon a Kaiju with a cargo ship. But the visuals will have to be this film's calling card because the ballast that holds it back is generic acting, monster film cliches and a sparse script. Ron Perlman, notwithstanding a tiny role, manages to shine as Hannibal Chau.

The effort to inject romance between Mori and Becket is redundant. For once though, the battle for the planet is being fought someplace other than the USA. Although the story line is passable, the real stars in Pacific Rim are the Jaegers.

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