MovieCriticDave

There's little debate that no post-WWII conflict came closer to a true nuclear engagement than the Cuban missile crisis - and rarely does a film work so hard and succeed so thoroughly in telling such an historical tale with substantial historical accuracy as "Thirteen Days."

Starring Bruce Greenwood as a phenomenally on-point John Kennedy, "Days" tells a gripping chronological tale of both official and unofficial diplomacy that turned the crisis from one of war to unmistakable American success. Aside from a pointlessly overblown and annoying part for Kevin Costner as Kenny O'Donnel, "Days" is a wonderfully constructed piece that otherwise strives for historical accuracy from the American discovery of the Soviet-backed missiles in Cuba, to the masterful lecture by Adlai Stevenson in the UN, to the "unofficial" diplomatic offer to retire antiquated Jupiter missiles from Europe in concert with a pledge not to invade the island nation.

"Days" wavers a bit with the needless interposition of nuclear test footage and the infamous "drop and cover" civil defense drills of the era, presumably as a way to punctuate a necessarily introspective and narrative view of the diplomatic back-channels and administration in- fighting undertaken to overcome the crisis. And the principals work too hard to master their New England accents, of which Costner's is easily the worst.

From an historical perspective, those involved during the crisis insist O'Donnell's role is drastically overblown, and clearly Costner's participation seems contrived and self-important. Fortunately, the deft direction Roger Donaldson keeps the viewer engaged with the broader epic and the ultimate focus on Kennedy's wisdom and leadership in it's resolution, guided by the book of the same title written by Ernest May.

"Days" isn't your typical action-adventure thriller, with heroic stars rolling down mountains and firing machine guns at virtual bad guys, but considering it's very real undertones and the reality it depicts, it surely merits the attention of anyone who lived through the crisis, or those now enjoying the fruits of its resolution.

Ever hear stories about bad TV sitcoms remaking episodes of older, worse sitcoms simply by changing the scripts some?

Well, somewhere, Jane Fonda and Michael Douglas are either outraged or delighted upon hearing Julia Roberts and George Clooney have remade their 1979 nuclear panic classic, "The China Syndrome." Too bad they transformed it into a really bad parable about contemporary financial angst in "Money Monster."

"China Syndrome," for those unaware or too young to know, was Fonda's dramatic entry into the debate over the risks of nuclear-based power plants. Fonda was a reporter, and Douglas, her photographer, with Jack Lemmon playing the antihero within a corrupt power company. "Syndrome" drew directly from great public trepidation about the safety of nuclear power; "Money Monster" tells precisely the same story (right down to several specific visual elements) against a financial corruption backdrop; it makes Roberts a TV producer, Clooney a TV stock market henchman (an outrageous and some times embarrassing rip-off of CNBC's Jim Cramer), with the antihero played by the lesser-known Jack O'Connell. O'Connell sets this ball rolling by taking Clooney's character hostage on live TV and demanding "answers" following a financial meltdown arising from a "glitch" in one company's computerized market trading algorithms.

On its own, "Money Monster" wavers from contemporary morality play to dumb, overplayed semi-comedy crime drama as its story unfolds. Clooney moves from the self-absorbed TV host to a clown more in the vein of his character from "O Brother, Where Art Thou"; but at least "Monster" gives the audience a few uncomfortable laughs - more than can be said of Clooney's abominably unfunny comedy, "Hail, Caesar." Roberts gives a few fleeting moments of credibility, but seems to phone in half of a performance when it's evident her character's primary role is to toss out TV producer jargon at regular intervals. You can't even bank on the Clooney-Roberts chemistry to help "Monster"; they're barely on screen together until the very end, and by then it doesn't really matter anymore.

There are the requisite dumb cops, incompetent police response teams, even geeky, stereotypical hackers mixed in to "Monster's" play all to force the point that only Clooney and Roberts can resolve the bad- guy answers the film demands. And we'll leave the answers - and the ending - to the viewer....

...Unless they just want to catch a copy of "China Syndrome," and save themselves the effort.

I wasn't sure exactly what to expect going into Tomorrowland, and I'm even less sure what I saw coming out of it.

Brad Bird's intensely promoted, George Clooney-led vehicle is sold rather transparently as an advertisement for Disney's not-so-ironically named areas of its famous theme parks. To be sure, there are plenty of fairly plain allusions to Disneyworld and Disneyland elements throughout "Tommorowland." Yet the frenetic and often uneven pacing makes it hard to know exactly where the viewer is supposed to jump on board in this curious if feint morality tale pitting optimism versus pessimism in a blender-like mixture of sci-fi, time travel, cyborgs, and general absurdity. If "Blade Runner", "Star Wars", and "Star Trek" crossed with "Back To the Future" and crash-landed in Orlando, "Tormorrowland" would surely be in the merged wreckage.

Ultimately, however, "Tomorrowland" plays less like a commentary on a avoiding an inevitably dystopian human future than an introspective view of the current state of Disney itself; a utopian notion gone awry without its visionary to guide it. Amid its fantastic visuals and caffeinated storytelling is a much simpler notion - that someone recognizes Disney, itself, is a little bit broken, replacing its simple stories and animations for explosions and grand effects, and aspiring to recruit contemporary visionaries to help it regain its lost way.

Can humanity regain its lost way? Can Disney? In its own, heartfelt and sincere, IMAX-inspired way, "Tomorrowland" aspires to put the question out there. Ultimately, it provides no answer; it offers only the hope of one, and an uncomfortable one at that.