This review was written a few months back but has only been recently published due to other concerns. I’m happy to have it published with Buzz Magazine and hope you enjoy reading it here http://buzzmagazine.com.au/justice-league-2/ Some of the staff at Buzz have been through a lot over the past year and to have them and the magazine continue means a lot to me and getting to be a part of that is really great. Justice League‘s belated but now accomplished publishing is a turning point for me showing we’re back on track and gathering steam. Next up should be the last belated review for Best Picture Winner The Shape of Water.
Based out of Victoria, Buzz Magazine was one the longest running street press magazines in Australia being published in print from 1993 to 2010. Some fine writers have worked for Buzz over the years and gone onto successful careers in media since and there is simply no way to measure the contribution the mag made to local music over its print run. With such words and minimal advertising on the website the impression could be taken that Buzz is now semi-retired. Yet the site is quite prolific with new write-ups on a daily basis, the ongoing interest of fans old and new and contributions from some very talented people indeed.
Kung Fu Panda 3 is a perfectly serviceable family animated comedy to take the kids to. The first sequel remains the high point of this series and hopefully this trilogy capper will see the series bow out. Visually arresting, with comedy of a lower denomination, the empowering message of the first movie is all played out and we’ve come full circle dealing with lead character Po’s past.
In this film a new even more powerful villain than the last one Grandmaster Oogway (J.K. Simmons) defeats the Spirit realm and returns to our Mortal realm to take on everybody’s favourite Panda Po. Po (Jack Black) himself in the meantime has taken on being a training master from his former teacher Master Shithru (Dustin Hoffman) who has committed himself to mastering Qi. What is Qi? Well in Chinese traditional culture Qi is important to defeating other kung fu practitioners in this movie. Also something about life force or energy or something. I would be more deferential to it if it wasn’t for the fact that the film is not. It’s a plot device in the form of Jade charms and nothing more. A bigger development comes in the discovery of orphan Po’s father Li (Bryan Cranston) who sets off a jealous streak within mother duck like foster father Ping (James Hong). Po, Li and Mr. Ping travel to a secret Panda village where Po sets out to learn Qi by being true to himself. Like Black himself, this series has always enjoyed revelling in fat jokes for Po while also making the powerful message that taking people on face value is a mistake. That all of us are capable of great things if we believe in ourselves. This series has literally had its five bowls of dumplings and eaten them too.
The first film was fine enough diverting fare with the character of Ping being an original take on the loving father of a warrior. The second film seemed to expand the series and the quality of DreamWorks animation, it was artsy using different animation style for a moving flashback, scoring a neat villain and even developing some of the relationships of the core group characters. By finally having Po meet other Pandas the film comes full circle and takes the character to a logical conclusion but the laughs aren’t as big, it’s getting harder to sell Po needing to train more to defeat an even more powerful villain than the last and the animation which has remained spectacular is only as good as what we have come to expect. There’s nothing wrong with that but there’s a difference between this and say Inside Out. It’s that difference that keeps an adult entertained at a kid’s movie. The kid, well they should love it.
The man drives a big old SUV onto a house on a hill in suburban woods like any old house you’d see in your neck of the woods. There’s a Gatling gun hidden at the front of the interior for home protection. At dinner with perfectly placed table settings and he sits down to eat food uniform in shape and temperature. Then he closes his bedroom door to go to sleep and plays heavy metal music. Lights flash in his room as he takes a wooden club and rubs it along his shins in a rhythmic and comforting manner. The noise, the visual stimulation, and the pressure it is all to help him cope with the outside world as a highly functioning individual with autism.
These are the scenes that makes The Accountant something new and interesting for an action thriller but they become less frequent as the different plot threads unravel to a third act of action sequences. For a while though this film delivered on the promise of its premise and thankfully it is always at worst at the very least a perfectly serviceable action thriller.
Ben Affleck stars as Christian Wolff, a forensics accountant who works for numerous criminal enterprises (I guess everybody has to make a living somehow in this economy). In fact Chrissy boy is doing just fine for himself with original copies of comic books from the 1930s and classic art pieces. Downside is his work makes him incredibly knowledgeable of said criminals so he needs to maintain a particular set of skills. Fortunately when he was but a poor autistic boy knee high to a grasshopper his Daddy dearest happened to be a psychological warfare officer in the United States Army and well he done fuck that boy up. A strong believer of nature not raise my boys to be some pussies Wolff Blass went from chasing some French boys down a rainy alley when he was twelve to being an elite trained martial artist and sharp shooter. There’s a bit more to it than that but part of the pleasure of the film is a series of flashbacks that unravel the mystery of Christian’s origins. In the meantime the FBI led by Ray King (J.K. Simmons) and data analyst Marybeth Medina (Cynthia Addai-Robinson) is trying to ascertain if Wolff is just one person and where he is. Christian himself goes to work in a legit job auditing a private corporation Living Robotics who need help discovering the source of some financial discrepancies. He meets with the CEO Lamar Blackburn (John Lithgow) who immediately seems too nice to not be shifty and one of their accountants Dana Cummings played by Anna Kendricks who is too Anna Kendricky to not become some sort of ally who will challenge Christian’s long held isolation and reserved emotions.
Most of the cast it has to be said are playing the type of roles they’ve become known for. Kendrick is a little quirky and smart but also cute as, Lithgow charmingly untrustworthy, Simmons as sarcastic and authoritative, Jon Bernthal as a rival assassin who appears downright dangerous and unpredictable so shout out to Cynthia Addai-Robinson who I have not seen before. Ben Affleck as Wolff portrays his character well, no expert on autism I think he plays certain scenes of frustration well and is suitably dialled down and restrained throughout the bulk of the running time. Wolff has a kind heart and a keen mind and the punk ass kid from Armageddon sells it and anybody who has seen Affleck’s Batman knows the guy can sell a fight scene but I can’t help but wonder if there are other actors out there, maybe from Boston originally too, who would’ve created more sympathy.
This is the type of film which impresses with its smarts and patience, more so in the first half. Whole scenes are given time to breath where people converse and get a feel for what the other character is planning (Addai-Robinson and Simmons particularly shine in one). When the action comes it is exciting and appears to utilise stunt work more than the manipulation of pixels. The Accountant could have elevated itself beyond the genre if it had been prepared to go a little deeper with the challenges of autism for a person in this line of work, in life in general. Certain threads and characters get dropped without realising their full potential and the finale may have one twist too many. Still after Jason Bourne and Suicide Squad, I’ll take a good film as a win, hell I might even line up for the sequel. In the meantime kids with autism around the world are turning to their parents and saying I now know I can dream big of being an assassin working for criminals when I grow up. So there’s that.
A bigger development comes in the discovery of orphan Po’s father Li (Bryan Cranston) who sets off a jealous streak within mother duck like foster father Ping (James Hong). Po, Li and Mr. Ping travel to a secret Panda village where Po sets out to learn Qi by being true to himself. Like Black himself, this series has always enjoyed revelling in fat jokes for Po while also making the powerful message that taking people on face value is a mistake. That all of us are capable of great things if we believe in ourselves. This series has literally had its five bowls of dumplings and eaten them too. 
Back to the Drawing Board Productions 