Avengers: Age of Ultron

The Avengers assemble....again.

After the events of the first Avengers film and Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Age of Ultron finds the titular heroes in Europe in an attempt to retrieve Loki's scepter. Though successful in their mission, The Avengers come across Pietro and Wanda Maximoff (Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen) who prove to be successful antagonists to the team.

Once back on their home soil, Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) and Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) discover within the scepter lies artificial intelligence. Keeping this secret from the rest of the team, Tony and Bruce try to complete the Ultron defense program. Unforeseen side effects from this tampering, though, create Ultron (James Spader) who becomes fully aware and sets about on a path to destroy all humans with the help of Pietro and Wanda.

Coupled with Ultron's plan of total destruction, The Avengers begin to fracture at the lack of trust and communication. After an attempt to stop Ultron in Africa fails, the team sets about on a second-act downward spiral at Clint Barton's (Jeremy Renner) house to try and get the team back together and reformulate a plan to stop Ultron.Tony, Bruce and Clint along with Thor, (Chris Hemsworth) Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) and Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) re-evaluate with Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) and reassemble The Avengers.

This film tries to go darker than the first, yet comes across jumbled and in need of another pass by the editors. While trying to couple The Avengers along with Pietro and Wanda along with Ultron, some characters get lost in the shuffle while others move to the forefront. This is both good and bad.

On the good side, Natasha sees a relationship begin to form with Bruce. It was nice to see the one female hero be strong and the only person that has a chance to calm Bruce when the Hulk is released (not meant to be perverted in any way). Though the relationship seems to begin out of nowhere, and the time needed to make their growing bond not there, it was nice to see an attempt be made for the human characters.

Along with that, Clint Barton actually gets the most humanistic role in the film. Instead of being a supporting player to the marquee names of The Avengers, we get to see Clint's personal life; including having a family. Even though, like listed above, not enough time is delegated to fully immersing the audience into Clint's life, the seeds have been laid if the filmmakers wanted to showcase Clint's personal life and history. Clint also gets the best speech in the film; near the end, Clint is trying to instill confidence into a character and Jeremy Renner's delivery along with the well-written speech create a satisfying moment.

On the other end of the spectrum, Thor ends up taking a backseat in the film. After the events in Africa, Thor takes off to meet with Dr. Eric Selvig (Stellan Skarsgard) about nightmarish visions that Wanda put into Thor's head. This sequence comes off as rushed and feels like it was either written at the last minute or the editor had a fun time chopping the sequence down.

Though it may seem like I am being more negative than positive about the film, that isn't the case. What Avengers: Age of Ultron has is an entertaining mess of a film. The climax is the exact same as the first Avengers film (large scale destruction, heroes fighting multiple CGI enemies, etc.) yet was more entertaining to me. The rest of the film was solid if somewhat scattershot with trying to provide enough screen time for old and new characters along with telling a cohesive story  and trying to appease all audiences. With so much going on in the film, it would be almost impossible to tell a story without it feeling like a jumbled mess.

Avengers: Age of Ultron is a jumbled mess, but a solidly entertaining jumbled mess.

6.8/10

American Hustle

Continuing to play catch-up, here's my review of Oscar hopeful: American Hustle.

Based off the ABSCAM operation and set during the late 1970's and early 1980's, Irving Rosenfeld (Christian Bale) is a low level con artist working with his girlfriend Sydney Prosser (Amy Adams). After both are caught in a scam by FBI Agent Richie DiMaso, (Bradley Cooper) Irving and Sydney reluctantly work for Richie to bring down various politicians including the mayor of Camden, New Jersey, Carmine Polito (Jeremy Renner).

Due to the complexity of the undercover operation, not all parts go smoothly. Irving's unpredictable wife Rosalyn (Jennifer Lawrence) complicates matters as a potential love triangle forms between Irving, Richie and Sydney. As the operation progresses, Irving and Carmine start to become friends and Richie wants the operation to grow in size in an effort to take down more and more corrupt politicians. The size of the operation begins spiral out of control and all parties involved begin to struggle to keep everything in order.

The plot is not as complex as it sounds, but it is more of a foundation for what truly makes this film entertaining: the performances. Even as I felt this was my favorite film of the year, I understand that American Hustle is not a great film. The plot falls by the wayside in favor of letting you enjoy the performances and the fun that the actors and director, David O. Russell are having.

The fun that the actors and crew are having does not take you out of the film. Instead the film brings you in and provides you with one of the best comedies of the year. Everything from the bad wigs, to bad accents and the way the characters handle the complicated scam that is presented in this film as a fun, but not overly-complicated 2 hour film. Even the title card that starts the movie, really sets the tone for how serious the film handles the ABSCAM plot that the film is based on. American Hustle tries really hard to entertain you, and based off what David O. Russell and the cast offer, I feel the film succeeds on that level.

The one weak link in the film for me, personally was Jeremy Renner. Everyone else in the film felt like they were on the same page, but with his character everything felt off and out of place and ultimately felt that Jeremy Renner was miscast as Mayor Polito. As the film progresses towards its conclusion, there is a scene where Irving and Carmine confront each other in Carmine's house. Carmine asks Irving if he is lying to him; at which time I felt bad for the character itself, but not by the performance delivered by Jeremy Renner.

I know there's been a lot of hate and backlash towards the film lately, but as just an enjoyable piece of cinema with overall good performances, it's hard to not rank American Hustle near the top of the best films list of 2013.

8.3/10