un-WANTED

So while many geeks streamed to Wall-E and many others went to WANTED, I've a job that lets me tackle both at the same time, though I saw Wall-E twice before going to WANTED.

Which says so much right there.

Wall-E is a given. Go see it, you're hearing the buzz, it is love and PIXAR poops magical animation fairies that keep them from making bad movies.

WANTED is a different machine. Very different. Almost completely unrelated to its source material different.

This is not a new habit in Hollywood as those of us who open those crazy book things and attend theater are well aware. Don't think this is my offensive against the average movie goers the world over because I'm an artsy intelligista- no really, don't think this, you'll probably sprain yourself- understand that this is how Art sometimes works. You see her work over there and think, oh what a sweet Art thing, I bet I can put my own spin on it, and you ask her if you can and she's like- okay, this sounds cool and soon everyone's looking at something that vaguely resembles the Art that originally stood before. Sometimes this works out and sometimes everyone is left wondering where their underwear went.

I digress into a point though.

Like many comic book-based films before it, WANTED deals with a fair amount of translation, especially since the original story had lots of in-jokes and ribbing of supervillains and the comics community that most people just wouldn't get unless you've been in the barracks with the rest of us nerdy losers screaming for dear life when an arc went Clone Saga on our asses. This is understandable and desirable. I like Change. Change means I can get something new and cool and in WANTED, there stood the potential for that. Unfortunately, that potential went tits-up halfway into the flick and I was left standing around wondering where my underwear went.

It wasn't a total bust though as James McAvoy has shown he can be an action god and make Neo look like a slow learner in the bullet-time class of action. In fact, he's one of the shining happy points of the movie, and since he's the main character even when the script, plot and supporting characters bail on him for parts unknown it's like having a healthy portion of a boat still taking you back home to port after a storm took the crew, some oars, most of the sail, the parrot and your love of the sea.

Seriously though, he's charming, believable, cut like a young 300 extra and really brings his role to life. Even when he's essentially following this crazy line of logic through the doodly lines of the plot, you still buy into McAvoy's performance. He did the same thing to me in Narnia where I was mildly bored with everything till he showed up as Mr. Tumnus and projected this quirk of joy and magic in his character that really kept the movie aloft for me. He's like Holly Hunter, who apparently can make even a bad script sound perfect. It's a shame these kinds of movies don't win Oscars because in the hands of a lesser actor, this thing would've just been a phoned-in action adaptation of a comic book. So let's all watch James McAvoy and think, "Gee, he's awesome. I want him to be the next Spider-man when Tobey Maguire falls off his ego."

Another high point that kept me going when the Loom of Fate showed up and looked really cool, but was not really connected to anybody's drive or actions or... Well, anything, was the music. Hoo-ray for Danny Elfman. Trent Reznor licks, hard guitars mixed with elegiac violins, and well-timed blasts of crescendo totally had me banging my head in the theater. I am actually inspired, in our techno-babble-times to actually go out and buy the CD to this thing.

The last bit that caught my eye before I gave up hoping Morgan Freeman and Angelina Jolie (the two heavyweight names who were hired to sneak the mass audience into a comic book movie) will do something interesting with their characters to make me give a shat was a lingering suspicion that one of the training guys looked familiar. And Repairman totally was! Like McAvoy, who was imported from across the pond for this film, Marc Warren is an English chap who's done some cool work. You can see him creeping you the hell out in Hogfather as Mr. Teatime and rocking out as Elton Pope in the "Love and Monsters" episode of Doctor Who. Such a shame he fell into this trick of a flick.

I felt tricked I guess. "Curve the bullet," "Kill one, save a thousand," big name actors and Mr. Tumnus showing his bad-ass side. It all sounded so good, but then when presented, it made me feel like I was watching a rough Assassin's Creed fanfiction that took place in the 20th century. Guess I'll have to keep an eye out for random Textile Factories to be sure.