Tár

Director: Todd Field
Starring: Cate Blanchett, Noémie Merlant, Nina Hoss, Sophie Kauer, Julian Glover, Allan Corduner, Mark Strong, Sylvia Flote, Adam Gopnik, Mila Bogojevic, Zethphan Smith-Gneist
Running Time: 158 min.
Rating: R

**The Following Review Contains Major Plot Spoilers For Tár **

★★★★ (out of ★★★★)

You could call renowned conductor Lydia Tár the Cate Blanchett of her field, or maybe even categorize Blanchett as the Tár of hers. Of course it'll have to be a strictly professional comparison, based entirely on their statuses as the greatest working in their respective fields. And isn't that all we ever have to go on? In his first film since writing and directing Little Children 16 years ago, Todd Field explores that very question, asking whether art can truly be separated from the artist, digging into this embattled title character with all the depth and precision we remember expecting from a filmmaker of his caliber. 

While impossible to know everything that drew Blanchett to the role, it's likely she and Field recognized the creative possibilities in showing that people, even the worst ones, are rarely just one thing. And highly successful, driven geniuses at the top of their craft are often much more complicated than that. Both literally and figuratively, Blanchett makes sure all those notes are hit, giving us a multi-layered examination of a woman who's capable of being likable and engaging, until you dare stick around a little longer. 

Labeling Lydia a monster would sell this nuanced portrayal short, but she's still a self absorbed egomaniac who basks in all the adulation and attention being the best brings. Among her many flaws is a fatal one that leads to complete career implosion, or cancellation, depending upon your perspective. There's good reason to believe the accusations have at least some legal merit, even if we don't really have enough to go on. But Field's not interested in guilt, innocence or "picking a side." It's a character study through and through, enabling viewers to draw their own conclusions based on the available information. And the closer you look, there's a lot to find.

World famous Lydia Tár (Blanchett) is the first female chief conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic, talking up a number of upcoming projects in an interview with The New Yorker's Adam Gopnik, including her live recording of Mahler's 5th Symphony, a new book (Tár on Tár) and the fellowship program she founded. Supported by her highly disciplined personal assistant Francesca (Noémie Merlant), violinist wife Sharon (Nina Hoss) and their young adopted daughter Petra (Mila Bogojevic), she also guest teaches at Julliard, encouraging students to look beyond issues of identity politics and focus on the music. 

When Lydia confides in fellowship manager Eliot Kaplan (Mark Strong) about her plans to replace assistant conductor Sebastian (Allan Corduner), a young Russian cellist Olga (actual cellist Sophie Kauer) arrives on the scene for a blind audition. Immediately attracted to her, Lydia pulls out all the stops to secure the Olga a seat, raising suspicions. This is while emails surface from a former student, Krista Taylor (Sylvia Flote), suggesting she was groomed into a sexual relationship by Lydia, which resulted in her dismissal from the program and a shattered reputation. Haunted by the escalating allegations, Lydia plows forward, but this might be the one situation she can't so easily control. And it very well could destroy her.          

Rather than speculate how or why Lydia would abuse her power, the more pertinent issue becomes...why not? With no one willing to hold her accountable for anything, she can. It's a perk of being a revered musical genius, which isn't to say she got there by accident. That's what makes this so compelling, as Field immerses us in her world for over two and a half hours, giving the potential wrongdoings room to marinate around this seemingly untouchable figure who's reputation will soon come crashing down to Earth.

The now infamous Julliard lecture scene is a microcosm for the entire film, as one of Lydia's students, Max (Zethphan Smith-Gneist), makes it known that as a BIPOC pangender they're no fan of Bach. And is Lydia ever the wrong person to tell that, as they argue before the humiliated student storms out of class. What's so fascinatingly uncomfortable about this episode is that she brings up a completely valid point about the dangers of dismissing art or music on the basis of the personal life of its creator. But in trying to convey that confronting the work head-on can often lead to a greater understanding, she gets lost in the throes of her performative narcissism. 

In taking a reasonable position she's more than entitled to, Lydia confidently owns the room, and while this kid clearly never stood a chance, it sends up the first red flag about her personality and how she handles those who disagree. It's a pattern that repeats itself and in hindsight can be looked at through another lens once those allegations hit. 

It's Lydia's behavior that triggers our doubts, along with what appears to be a predilection for younger women that everyone in her orbit seems fully aware of, especially her sickly wife Sharon, and more quietly concerned assistant Francesca. She shares genuine moments with both, but they know what she's all about, and the lengths she'll go to manipulate the power structure to fit her needs. Even the vulnerable Sebastian, a conductor on the chopping block, knows, and we see how quickly she weaponizes that against him. Lydia's only real, non-transactional connection is with her daughter and  that's overshadowed by a chilly schoolyard encounter with one of her classmates.

There are no accidents in a film this meticulously constructed so Field's decision to have an alleged sexual predator be a gay woman rather than your typical straight white male isn't irrelevant. The decision definitely splits the deck in a way, pushing gender politics aside while also taking pains not to prejudice us either way in regards to her potential guilt. In telling so much of her story without words, he uses music, sounds, gestures and visuals to get inside a certain life and routine, baring witness to a career slowly crumbling, piece by piece. 

Going far enough in depicting the minutiae of her everyday that you'd be forgiven for thinking it's a biopic of a real person, Blanchett believably captures how exalted individuals like this can find ways to constantly compartmentalize their actions. It's long, but there isn't a moment wasted as you're hypnotized by the details and clues, realizing there's a lot more to this than what appears on the surface, with the film even flirting in supernatural thriller territory. And none of this necessarily confirms Lydia's guilt, leaving us to imagine what else could have been found, or even consider it really is the case of a troubled girl targeting her. 

Krista's suicide marks the no point of return, but how it's handled is the film's masterstroke, offering another unique perspective on Lydia that invites extra consideration. More than one thing can be true at once, as coming from very little to scratch and claw her way to the top seems to have defined all her later actions. And while she's relatively dismissive about how being a woman affected this path, it's fair to assume it had an impact.

Field gives us numerous opportunities to figure Lydia out, as if such a maddening puzzle could ever be completely solved. But we get to know the woman so well that it's easy to guess what she had for breakfast yesterday, the type of wine she'll send back in a restaurant, or her Sight and Sound film ballot. Blanchett brilliantly embodies all these contradictions and conundrums, providing good reason to tout this as one of her finest performances, if not most compulsively watchable. And given who we're talking about, that's not small praise.

Lydia physically attacking her replacement for Mahler's 5th is shocking enough, but the killer ending reveal is both pitifully depressing and outright hilarious, leaving little doubt as to the depths she's sunk, while reopening the floodgates for further debate. If conducting the Monster Hunter video game score in an auditorium full of cosplayers is a jarring surprise, it's one contrasted by how seriously she still manages to take the work. 

Considering her enormous ego, this new job should be a fate worse than death, cruel karmic comeuppance on par with that guest conductor role, or more insultingly, a human metronome. But she outwardly treats this humiliation as if it were no different from the Berlin Philharmonic, accessing that childhood love of music we glimpsed when she tearfully watched Bernstein's VHS tapes in her old home. 

Whether she's Linda or Lydia, it hardly matters anymore, as even her estranged brother acknowledges how she never quite figured that out. But seeing her conduct for an audience you could easily picture her mocking, the realization sets in that Lydia's arrogant and determined enough to believe she'll come back from this. And knowing what we do, it's entirely possible she's right. 

Cruella

Director: Craig Gillespie
Starring: Emma Stone, Emma Thompson, Joel Fry, Paul Walter Houser, Tipper Seifert-Cleveland, Emily Beecham, Kirby Howell-Baptiste, Mark Strong, John McCrea, Kayvan Novak, Jamie Demetriou
Running Time: 134 min.
Rating: PG-13

★★★ ½ (out of ★★★★)

It's understandable that a certain amount of cynicism would accompany the release of Disney's Cruella, their latest attempt to repackage another one of their classic animated properties as a live-action adaptation. While they've traveled this road before with 101 Dalmations in 1996 and its sequel four years later, those predated the company's recent realization they could mine their entire catalog for a new generation unbothered by frequent complaints they're shamelessly cashing in on the past at the expense of creativity. Whether it's Cinderella (twice), Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King, or more recently, Mulan, results have been decidely mixed, most succeeding only in promoting a greater appreciation for the originals, which is probably still fine with Disney. 

Part fairy tale, Part supervillain origin story, part The Devil Wears Prada, director Craig Gillespie's take on Disney's most nororious dog hater doesn't deserve mention alongside those aforementioned reboot experiments mainly because there actually seems to be a definitive reason for its existence. It's worthwhile not only for adding something new to the mythos, but having more vision, style and purpose than most of what they've released in recent years. Taking place in kind of this heightened, hyper reality, it looks and feels tonally different from their usual fare, displaying far more ambition than anyone could have reasonably expected when the project was announced.

Comparisons could be made to 2019's Joker, until stopping to realize it still manages to be an entirely satisfying family movie that doesn't look out of place next to Disney's biggest hits. And that's a major accomplishment considering dalmations literally murder a woman in the opening minutes. It's crazy and audacious, but the key is in recalibrating this eventual villain as an anti-hero rising up against a system holding her down. Dana Fox and Tony McNamara's inventively tight script pushes back on the idea that Cruella de Vil is someone to root against or delusional in her beliefs. She's basically right about everything, and watching Emma Stone navigate that while battling an inescapable nastiness bubbling up inside is really something to behold. This, along with an inspired premise and frenetic pacing make its 134 minutes feel more like 30, demonstrating the potential benefits of repurposing classic characters to more strongly resonate with contemporary audiences. 

As a young child, Estella (Tipper Seifert-Cleveland) is a talented artist with an eye for fashion and a mean streak matched only by the white streak covering half her hair. After school fighting prompts mom Catherine (Emily Beecham) to remove her and relocate to London, she stops at a posh upper-class party to ask a mysterious woman for financial help. But when Estella's antics accidentally attract the attention of three ferocious dalmations, her mother is pushed off a balcony to her death. Orphaned and guilt-ridden, we flash forward to the height of the 70's fashion craze in London as a now young adult Estella (Stone) and pick-pocket friends Jasper (Joel Fry) and Horace (Paul Walter Houser) get by with thievery before she lands a janitorial job at the Liberty department store. 

With Estella's dreams of a career in fashion design quickly fading with each toilet she cleans, a chance encounter with legendary, but ice cold haute couture design chief, the Baroness (Emma Thompson) leads to an apprenticeship at her prestigious firm. But as the talented nwecomer rises up the ranks as the Baroness' go-to underling, she makes a shocking discovery about her abusive boss' relationship to her birth mother, leading Estella to plot revenge and introduce the fashion world to her outrageously diabolical alter-ego, Cruella.    

None of this would be worth doing if not for the surprisingly fresh, modern take on Cruella, who's placed against a backdrop and colorful punk aesthetic perfectly suited to the material. But before the narrative even gets there, the prologue focusing on a young, troublemaking Estella provides an effective entry point, at times resembling a rock biopic more than your typical Disney outing. Of course, some cartoonish bells and whistles are still present, but Gillespie incorporates those in better than anyone else in his position has, keeping the focus where it belongs as we follow this little hellraiser on her journey. 

Seifort-Cleveland plays the misbehaving Estella with moxie and heart, immediately getting us on her side despite the character's bratty behavior, then eventually because of it when we realize what she's truly going through. It might be the most overlooked, underappreciated performance in how it sets the stage for what Stone will do later, with both working as mirrors for the other in ways you rarely see when two actors play the same character at different ages. 

It's a seamless transition when Stone's bespeckled, but determined Estella begins ingratiating herself into London's fashion scene and falls under the wing of Emma Thompson's Baroness. Given its context, Thompson's turn is just as effective as Meryl Streep's, whose Miranda Priestly had to at least partially serve as some kind of inspiration for this. She walks all over Estella until the power dynamic of their initially imbalanced relationship is considerably altered by a major development.

The ensuing feud that escalates when the two Emmas face off is where the movie really finds its voice. And it's a loud one, complete with numerous musical montages and music video-style cutting that goes way over-the-top, but intentionally so. Everyone from The Stones to The Doors to Blondie to Queen are all over the soundtrack, but the movie gets away with it since everything fits the action and setting of the story like a glove. That's only bolstered by Nicolas Karakatsanis' cinematography and some wild costume designs by Oscar winner Jenny Beaven that doesn't just compliment the proceedings, but plays as integral a part in the story as any single character, if not more so.

All these elements converge to make the character of Cruella seem more like a counter-culture badass and social disruptor than just a formidable challenger to the Baroness' fashion throne. Stone plays Cruella as Estella's lastest design, carefully cultivated to hurt and humiliate Baroness, but matched by her quieter Estella scenes as a mousy busybody trying to protect her cover. This leads to a Clark Kent-Superman dynamic hinging on whether the two can continue co-existing, a hook the film's able to retain right up until its final minutes. Keeping the childhood trauma in the front of our minds, Stone gives an already unfairly overlooked, award-caliber performance made all the more remarkable by the fact that she's pulling double duty the whole time. In playing a character playing a character, the actress is consistently add layers of complexity and nuance to what could have been a live-action caricature, all within the tight confines of a big budget family vehicle.

Speculation as what this would look like if it wasn't a Disney film, or maybe had an 'R' rating instead of its already unexpected 'PG-13,' seems inevitable. Could it have gone further if commercial concerns weren't such an issue and there wasn't a product or franchise to push? Maybe, but to some degree Gillespie deserves even more credit for not only creatively delivering with those guardrails in place, but using them to his advantage in crafting an original story freed from any noticeable concessions. In doing that, Cruella pulls off a tricky balancing act, boldly reconciling art and commerce in a style its title character would unquestionably appreciate. 

The Imitation Game

Director: Morten Tyldum
Starring: Benedict Cumberbatch, Keira Knightley, Matthew Goode, Mark Strong, Charles Dance, Allen Leech, Matthew Beard, Roy Kinnear, Alex Lawther, Jack Bannon
Running Time: 114 min.
Rating: PG-13

★★★ ½ (out of ★★★★)

In the historical heroes gallery that comprises this year's Best Picture race, World War II codebreaker and cryptanalyst Alan Turing stands out from the pack. Not only because his story's so different, but because so few have heard of him or that story until recently. With The Imitation Game, director Morten Tyldum makes a biopic that doesn't feel like one even when going through the usual motions because its subject transcends it, as does Benedict Cumberbatch's brilliant lead performance. It's been endlessly compared to The Theory of Everything but other than both being British biopics about tortured geniuses, there are very few similarities aside from sharing a stigma they were made as awards bait.  While Everything was very much traditional biopic that methodically walked us through Stephen Hawking's marriage and illness, careful not to ruffle any feathers, this is an exciting sprint through the life and work of a complicated and persecuted man at odds with his own identity.

When this ends, you're able to understand exactly what he did and why it was so important, even if his story's the biographical equivalent of a tree falling in the forest, with someone accomplishing a feat so risky and ahead of its time it couldn't be revealed for nearly 50 years. The unheralded father of artificial intelligence and computers, Turing's odd quirks and anti-social behavior draw closer comparisons to Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network than a legend history ignored. But carrying the heavy load of his "big secret" during an unfortunately intolerant time is what ultimately caused his undoing and eventual anonymity, even in death. Tyldum's efforts go a long way toward correcting that. 

Occasionally jumping back-and-forth through time between his days being bullied at boarding school in 1927 and eventual arrest and interrogation as a college professor in 1951, the bulk of the film centers on Alan Turing's (Cumberbatch) time working at England's Bletchley Park at the height of World War II. After an awkward, confrontational interview with Commander Alastair Denniston (Charles Dance), the arrogant but gifted Turing is hired and eventually put in charge of a covert cryptography team that includes Hugh Alexander (Matthew Goode), John Cairncross (Allen Leech) and Peter Hilton (Matthew Beard).  Appointed by the government to secretly decrypt the Nazi Enigma machine, Turing oversees a group of men who neither like nor respect him, building a machine named "Christopher" that he hopes can decode the German encryptions. Controversially, he also adds a woman, Cambridge grad Joan Clarke (Keira Knightley), to the team. But with Denniston breathing down his neck for immediate results and a secret life that could potentially destroy him, Turing will have to learn how to play nice with others if there's to be any chance of saving lives and eventually ending the war.

Turing is immediately introduced as a conceited oddball who's to difficult to work with and nearly impossible to work for. He doesn't listen, can't look you in the eye, has problems carrying on a normal conversation and does whatever he wants regardless of the consequences or how it effects anyone else. He often comes off as an Apergers sufferer before anyone knew what it was or how to diagnosis it, with his saving grace being that he's a genius who's right about nearly everything. The machine represents the apex of his intellectual capabilities, but whether he'll admit it or not, he needs the help in honing and perfecting it to accomplish its code-breaking goal.

The push and pull of the story is Turing's constant battles with his entire team since his mind doesn't have the time or capacity for dealing with people. The lone exception is Joan, whom he goes to bat for reasons more complicated than it first appears. At first, it seems as if he's just simply using her abilities to get this done. We then suspect he might be unselfishly pushing her to fulfill her potential. And then briefly, Graham Moore's script begins hinting at a burgeoning romance between the two. This is where the movie turns on its heels and heads in an entirely new direction, as Turing's closeted homosexuality comes to the surface and threatens to end him, insuring he'll face criminal charges or worse.

Turing's secret is one he didn't even seem to be in on himself or refuses to acknowledge as reality in those times, as his misguided marriage proposal to Joan confirms. He just knows he's "different." And that's really the prism through which the whole film and Cumberbatch's work in it can be viewed, so it's strange many feel the script brushes this aspect under the rug. Every scene is about his inability to fit in, most especially ones opposite the similarly marginalized and underestimated Joan and the flashbacks to his childhood (featuring a great Alex Lawther performance as young Turing).

It's only by cracking Enigma that he can escape all this, and because Tyldum is so good at showing rather than telling, it's these scenes that crackle with the most tension and excitement. It isn't just solving Enigma, but the actions need to be taken afterwards to insure they maximize the intel they have without tipping off the Germans. They're walking a thin line that ends up introducing all sorts of complicated moral questions that the characters and audience wouldn't immediately consider. The cruelest irony is that even after Turing figures it all out, saving millions of lives and ending the war, the secret of his heroic actions isn't the one that ends up getting out. It's the other one, and it destroys him. 

Cumberbatch is a revelation in this, called upon to reflect two entirely different dimensions to Turing's personality. There's the quirky, arrogant genius and the vulnerable, frightened child that's still very prevalent from the earlier flashbacks. It isn't until the third act that they completely converge and we're able to gain a full appreciation and understanding of the subtle acting choices he made earlier. While Turing may have had deeper problems co-existing with others, it's his sexuality that proves to be his true undoing. It's now insensitive to refer to it as a "handicap" or "disability," but at the time it was viewed as that or far worse, and Cumberbatch rightly plays it as such.

The film rarely cuts corners in that regard, as reluctant in revealing it as he is until the time comes to hammer home its importance in determining his tragic trajectory. Opposite him, Knightley delivers her typically solid period drama performance, which is to say she's completely effective without necessarily impressing. She can do this in her sleep, but at least here she's afforded the added benefit of playing a character of agency who can't be the love interest. But I still say her career best performance in Begin Again from earlier in the year would have made for a far worthier acting nomination.

One of the harsher criticisms leveled against the film is that even as well done as it is, this is something you'd just as easily be able to see as a television miniseries on History, PBS or BBC. But given the high quality of dramatic TV these days, is that really such an insult? While I'd agree there's nothing especially noteworthy about Tyldum's direction, a lot can be said for knowing when you have a compelling story and just getting of the way to let your actors tell it. Like most of the "based on a true story" awards contenders this year, creative liberties were likely taken with key facts, but here you can legitimately marvel at the surprising facts we do get, or that we've gotten any at all considering the unusual circumstances. The Imitation Game is absorbing and sincere enough to take the line, "Sometimes it is the people no one imagines anything of who do the things that no one can imagine" and make it seem like more than just an empty platitude.
                

John Carter

Director: Andrew Stanton
Starring: Taylor Kitsch, Lynn Collins, Samantha Morton, Mark Strong, Willem Dafoe, Mark Strong, Thomas Haden Church, Ciaran Hinds, Dominic West, Bryan Cranston, Daryl Sabara
Running Time: 132 min.
Rating: PG-13

★★★ (out of ★★★★)

I really don't care how much money a movie makes or what it costs to make it, though it seems many in the media do, holding it up as a testament to its creative worth. Of course, it's nice for the people involved and the studio releasing it when their project cleans up at the box office, but just because an expensively made movie is a financial flop doesn't make it an artistic failure. Any more than it's necessarily a success if it rakes in the dough. In this era of sequels, prequels, remakes, reboots, Twilights, Transformers and Marvel movies, just about the only argument that can be made in favor of a relationship between quality and cost is an inverse one. Yet somehow, Disney's John Carter, a fun, spectacularly silly throwback adventure that has its heart in the right place has become this symbol of Hollywood greed and corporate avarice because it didn't recoup its high price tag. Really guys? You're gonna attack THIS?

Far from the Waterworld-sized debacle it's been touted as, JC is actually an intelligently told fantasy fable featuring a likable protagonist, an incredibly strong female lead and great visual scope. It's also a bit of a mess, albeit a fascinating one. The plot's too convoluted with about three or four different timelines and villains, and a more streamlined screenplay would have resolved some lingering issues, but that's the extent of it. Its worst crime just may have been being based on Tarzan author Edgar Rice Burroughs' 100 year-old series of stories that inspired the likes Star Wars, Superman, Flash Gordan and Avatar, but arriving onscreen last, unintentionally making it look and feel derivative when it's just late. With just a little tweaking, this really could have been a huge deal. And with his first foray into live action, longtime Pixar director Andrew Stanton certainly does a smoother job fleshing out a world and navigating intraplanetary politics than Lucas did with his prequels, as faint as that praise may seem. But it isn't faint, as more sci-fi adventures could stand to be as fun as this.    

After a brief, poorly placed prologue on Barsoom (A.K.A. Mars) that plays as a strange cross between Return of the Jedi and 300, we're informed of the death of John Carter (Taylor Kitsch) of Virginia, a Confederate Civil war Captain who left nephew Edgar Rice Burroughs (Daryl Sabara) a diary explaining the circumstances that eventually lead to his death. It flashes back years earlier to the Arizona territory where Union Colonel Powell (Bryan Cranston in a blonde wig and colonial garb!) arrests him, but he escapes, leading them both to a cave where Carter is confronted by a Martian Thern named Matai Shang (Mark Strong) and transported--via a mysterious medallion--to Barsoom, where he's discovered by a Green Martian Tharks and their leader Tars Tarkas (Willem Dafoe). With his new ability to jump incredible heights and perform superhuman feats, Carter's unwillingly thrust into the middle of a bitter feud between rival cities Helium and Zodanga, with the evil Sab Than (Dominic West) plotting to end their war by marrying the headstrong Princess of Helium, scientist Dejah Thoris (Lynn Collins). Rescued by Carter, she promises to get him home and with the help of Tarkas' daughter, Sola (Samantha Morton) and a lizard dog named Woola as they embark on a treacherous journey across the Red Planet.

While the plot's way too complicated and at times unfocused, but for a film of this scale it's surprisingly deep, with the meat and bones of the story working really well and clear care put toward character development. Despite seeming to take a library's worth of Burrough's stories (supposedly it's mostly adapted from just one, The Princess of Mars) and attempting to jam it into a single overplotted feature, it's a shock this isn't harder to follow. I'm usually no fan of extensive CGI and think it's criminally overused, if not outright ineffective in most films, but the effects here are fairly realistic-looking.Yes, the entire budget is right up there for everyone to see on the screen, but at least desert vistas actually look like desert vistas. I hesitate in describing the Tharks as resembling Jar Jar Binks (which they kind of do) since they're more crisply rendered with a mixture of CGI, motion capture, and make-up, and not nearly as annoying, possessing identifiable traits that serve the narrative. Lizard dog Woola looks so real you'll want to take him home, while the pair of giant white apes Carter tangles with in a gladiatorial showdown recall the monstrous wompa Luke faced off against in The Empire Strikes Back.

The story does lull and lag in places (particularly the middle portion) while spinning off in a few different, sometimes problematic directions, but there was never a moment when I didn't care about what was happening or lost interest Carter or Dejah's predicament. Taylor Kitsch is solid as the lead, if kind of a blank. Then again, a blank hero is called for in this situation. This isn't the kind of movie that rises or falls with his performance so trying to pin the imaginary "blame" on him is pointless since any actor could have been plugged into the role with the same result. Whether he should have taken it is a different discussion altogether, but I'm glad he did regardless of the fallout because at least it's a start. He'll survive this and hopefully move on to edgier work, which is where his strength more likely lies. But all things considered, he did really well. Parts as memorable as Tim Riggins on Friday Night Lights don't come around every day on the big or small screen, so we may have to wait a while for him to find something comparable.

As tanned, tribal tattooed warrior princess Dejah, Lynn Collins is a real find in her first leading role. After co-starring in a handful of smaller, underseen projects without really registering much, she sure registers here. Her character is strong, beautiful, independent and intelligent, representing exactly the kind of lead female role we need more of in adventure movies. Collins is more than up to the task, never making her feel like a damsel in distress. If there were any justice she'd be a huge star off the back of this film. Instead, being in her mid-thirties, she may not even be given another opportunity at this level again. That's a shame and a sentence I should never have to type, but a chilly reminder of how Hollywood works. Give Disney credit for casting a mature woman in a woman's role instead of a kid in hopes of reeling in teen audiences. Now doing THAT would have been greedy, not to mention detrimental to the film.

If John Carter's guilty of anything it's over-ambition both in terms of visual design, and in telling a more involved story than was necessary. Not much of a crime from where I sit. That overreaching is especially evident in convoluted, twist-laden ending, which takes a bit to come into focus, but pays off in a satisfying finish. Much like Disney' unfairly maligned Tron: Legacy, it's a family film, but PG-13 and not made exclusively to sell toys. It's closer to an old school sweeping sword-and-sandals fantasy epic than a superhero movie. Of course, no one knew what it was. But Stanton did, and his slavish devotion to the source material is a creative plus that alienated confused audiences unfamiliar with "John Carter From Mars," but found it difficult to get psyched for a film simply titled, "John Carter." Knowing how it concludes, the title change does actually make sense, working best under the assumption they'll be a sequel. Barring a sudden resurgence on DVD, that seems unlikely, but not out of the realm of possibility. I wouldn't mind seeing one, or revisiting this because at least it dares to be different. It mostly succeeds. With untested stars and an ambitious story, John Carter takes chances. And when movies like that stop being made, then we're really screwed.