Monday Morning Critic – Captain America: The Winter Soldier and The Marvel Studios Sequel Problem – Trading Places, Eddie Murphy And Insider Trading

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MMC

The beginning of the summer movie season officially begins this weekend, in my opinion at least, because of two things. It’s April, for starters, and the first big film of 2014 arrives. Captain America: The Winter Soldier feel like the first big film of the year and the first event film of 2014, thus it feels like the kickoff of the summer film season. We’re still some time away from the summer truly arriving, of course, and I’ll be happy the day it gets warm enough that I can officially turn my furnace off until the winter. After this past winter in the Midwest, in the middle of the “Polar Vortex,” I’ll be happy when it’s so hot you can drop 10 lbs. in an afternoon outdoors.

But, before the weather gets warm enough that short skirts and muscle tees become popular to wear outdoors, we’ll be able to enjoy the summer movie experience. One thing is bothering me, though, about the first big film of the summer. In spite of the fact that a couple of people I know have seen the film already, and raved about it, I’m tempering my enthusiasm because of one main thing right now: Marvel Studios inability to make a high quality sequel.

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One of the things that has been lost in the rush to convert nearly every successful comic book property under contract, and able to be made into a film by Marvel & Disney properly, is that none of the sequels have been able to match the original in quality. It’s something that happens to action films en masse, of course, as the rare action movie sequel that equals or surpasses the original is few and far between. We can count on both hands the number of sequels that are as good, or better, than the original.

It’s a typical problem for any franchise but Marvel is the biggest studio in the game right now. Marvel films are a brand that are near guaranteed box office successes and the studios avoid releasing anything that could be a tentpole around Marvel releases during the summer season. Even Marvel films made outside of Disney rarely get true competition at the box office; comic book films have slowly become the juggernaut of the summer. But the one thing Marvel has yet to do is produce a sequel worth a damn.

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It’s interesting to note because the heavy lifting of comic book franchises is over, en masse, for them. The first generation of Marvel Heroes, starting with Robert Downey Jr. in Iron Man or what I like to call the Avengers Generation, have had their origin tales and are now in character building mode. With the exact origins already done it should be easier to craft something unique and interesting to do. We’ve been given these interesting characters and why they are the way they are.

Expanding on a character would seem to be easier, especially with a comic book character, because establishing an origin is always the most difficult thing to do in a comic book film. You have to balance out the origins, some of which are 50 years or are older, with a modern realism to it that both pays homage to the comic book and makes sense cinematically. It’s always the second film where we get the expanded character arc, and perhaps something interesting, out of a major character.

But so far? Nothing that has been better than a first effort in overall quality.

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When we look at the genre as a whole so far the high water mark has been a DC property, The Dark Knight, and a non-Marvel studio release (Spider-Man 2). Marvel may be commercially successful, and critically successful as well, when it comes to their franchises but it’s becoming bothersome on a certain level that the Marvel sequels are of decidedly lesser stuff. The heavy lifting is over … now should be the time when a screenwriter shouldn’t be burdened with trying to kick start a franchise.

Stuff for General George S. Pimpage, Esq

I wrote about Noah, which is in theatres. Didn’t like it, check out my extended thoughts by giving me some clickage.

Travis wasn’t a huge fan of Sabotage and my thoughts ran concurrent with his.

And now on MMC … jam out to K-Pop!

If you want to pimp anything email it to me with a good reason why. It helps to bribe me with stuff, just saying ….

A Movie A Week – The Challenge

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This week’s DVD – Trading Places

Can a film age very profoundly and yet still remain a comedy you have to see? Trading Place is that kind of film, a very funny film that has aged in the near 30 years since it was released.

The premise involves a pair of rich brothers, the Dukes, and their messing with the lives of two men. One’s a poor vagrant (Eddie Murphy) who’s begging for change. The other’s an upper level executive firm for their brokerage (Dan Ackroyd) they’ve groomed to make them a ton of money. For a dollar they see if they can turn the vagrant into one of them, and one of them into a vagrant, and thus try a social experiment of sorts.

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Ackroyd winds up losing everything and trying to find out why. Murphy winds up with the kind of life he always wishes he had … and finds himself struggling to leave his roots behind. When they find out that they’re being messed with, and that the Duke brothers are kind of scumbags who’d punch their mother for a dollar, they conspire together to do the exact same thing to them. With tons of cameos from their friends, and a fairly solid cast, is one of the high points in the career of John Landis on both a commercial and critical level. This was in the beginning part of the decade stretch of Landis’s career where he had his biggest hits.

Trading Places is in the top tier of his film-making prowess, behind The Blues Brothers and Animal House. Landis made his best work with Dan Ackroyd during this period both behind the camera and in front of it; this was a director and actor finding their groove and succeeding profoundly for an extended period of time. Throw in Jamie Lee Curtis at the peak of her 80s hotness, and almost entirely naked a couple times, and you’ve got the makings of a wacky Wall Street comedy that inspired Congress to make a law in 2010 dubbed the “Eddie Murphy Rule” on Insider Trading.

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Spoiler alert: here’s an explanation of the ending for those, like myself, who aren’t savvy to that arena. Seriously … all the stuff in this film was legal up until a couple years ago. It’s actually not illegal for a Congressman to do it, either. And they wonder why people view the stock market as a rigged game.

The film still works, though not nearly as much as it did in the 80s, because of a couple things. Mainly it’s due to Ackroyd and Murphy having terrific chemistry together, for starters, as the two have a number of high quality scenes together. Both are also in the middle of their comedy peaks, as well.

This was Murphy’s second film, his first after 48 Hours, and established him. Beverly Hills Cop would make him a permanent A-lister, and 48 Hours may have been his best performance, but Trading Places is an interesting film to watch him in. He’s not nearly as good as he was in either of the aforementioned films but this is Murphy finding himself in the role. Billy Ray Valentine is an interesting character and he’s about 90% right for the part. This film feels like it stuck to the script a lot, with Murphy’s ability to improv on a leash. Murphy feels a little constricted, as it looks like maybe they let him riff for a scene or two but wound up editing it out.

All in all it’s still a good comedy bordering on great through the perspective of time. Slightly strongly recommended.

What Looks Good This Weekend, and I Don’t Mean the $2 tall boys of Red Fox and community college co-eds with low standards at the Fox and Hound

Captain America 2: The Winter Soldier

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Scott “Kubryk” Sawitz brings his trademarked irreverence and offensive hilarity to Twitter in 140 characters or less. Follow him @ScottSawitz .