Funny. Touching. Ruthless. ”Ultra-American”
Everyone loves films about special people - superheroes or cool special agents, and in the past few years, interest in such stories has only increased. Of course, in a wide range of products, it is difficult to surprise the audience. And if the popularity of the traditional elegant spy Mr. Bond is not declining, then the filmmakers not involved in this film series have to seriously strain their imagination in order to squeeze something interesting out of the topic. Ultra-Americans is a kind of new wave of superhumans, and it turned out surprisingly well.Spoilers possible! In a small provincial American town lives an ordinary, unremarkable guy Mike Howell (Jesse Eisenberg). He works in a store next to a gas station, smokes pot, saves money for a ring for his girlfriend Phoebe (Kristen Stewart). He is quite satisfied with this calm, simple, relaxed life. But one day it turns out that Mike is a product of a government experiment, a super agent with outstanding physical and intellectual abilities, who had his memory erased. Moreover, it is going to be eliminated as a particularly dangerous object. And it started ...  There is nothing special in the idea itself, another question is how it was implemented. And the filmmakers approached the embodiment very creatively. The picture turned out to be a cheerful vinaigrette, but as a result everything looks whole. So, the film belongs to three genres at the same time - action, comedy and romantic melodrama. At the same time, it is difficult to say that the genres are intertwined - rather, the action fervently jumps from one to another. The story begins as a calm art house about two weed smokers who have shielded themselves from the world, then a tough and original action suddenly falls on us, comic scenes suddenly appear in the course of the action, and against the background of all this the story of true love continues to develop.  A special charm and originality of the picture is given by the fact that while the general outline of a typical story about a super agent is preserved, each element is made unconventional, which turns the story upside down and at the same time makes it more human and, oddly enough, realistic. This is especially true for Mike . As a rule, in such films, a hero who does not know about his abilities or has not yet received them is emphatically positioned as ordinary. But soon the viewer realizes that he is still special. Well, Mike is really ordinary. He is lazy, not ambitious and quite happy with his, frankly, single-celled life. His world is small and comfortable. It has weed, jazz on records, a beloved girl with whom you can discuss the astronaut monkey and various philosophical thoughts that come to mind while high. And he doesn't need anything else, like his girlfriend. Mike is stupid, but kind and harmless, so the past that has burst into a measured life does not please him at all. He's just terrified, he wants to go back to his cool tiny world. Even during bloody fights, the guy thinks more about how to still propose to his beloved. He doesn't want to accept the dark part of himself at all and the whole film continues to run from the beast inside. His actions are completely devoid of any plan, his brain, in moments of danger, works like a clock, the rest of the time beats in panic and acts chaotically, solving problems as they come. Jesse Eisenberg turned out to be an excellent choice for this role. He instantly goes from the cold fury of a ruthless killer to the touching, amusing insecurity of the real Mike .  Kristen Stewart has a curious character. The actress is sometimes not entirely unreasonably accused of a faded acting, but there is nothing to complain about in this film. The tandem Stuart-Eisenberg was a success, you believe in the sincerity of the love of their heroes, and the further, the clearer the depth of the feeling becomes. The love line does not interfere with the film at all, on the contrary, it is built into the plot very organically, in the end becoming the thread on which the entire surrounding motley orgy is strung. At the same time, there is no sentimentality in the film, instead we see real and believable relationships (albeit a little strange, but our heroes are weirdos themselves).  It is interesting that with all the scale of the action, the story can be called chamber, since the plot focuses on six characters. The secondary characters that mean something to the plot can be counted on one hand, most are just consumables for demonstrating the killer skills of Mike . In addition to a couple of main characters, Adrian Yates (Topher Grace) is worth noting. Adrian is an office plankton from the CIA, who made his way to the post of chief, and for the sake of promotion is ready to go literally over the heads (first of all, over the head of Mike ). Victoria Lasseter (Connie Britton) is also good - the creator of the "Sage" project, from which our super agent came. There are two more additional characters that are important for the disclosure of the rest of the characters. The first is Petey(Tony Hale), a former subordinate of Victoria , tossing between the orders of Yeats and loyalty to Lasseter , while the other is Hohmach (Walton Goggins), one of the experimental soldiers of Adrian . All of them are somehow interconnected and form an intricate network of relationships, the unwinding of which is very interesting to watch.  Actually, these relations in many ways make the overall picture so convex. Given the obviously fantastic situation the characters are in, everything in the film looks realistic. And the intrigues in the CIA are really dirty, and the behavior of people is absolutely believable - as in life, they panic, make mistakes, throw tantrums, do stupid things, are torn from insurmountable contradictions, and sometimes do vile or noble deeds. All this fills what is happening with meaning. But the main thing is that, like grass through the asphalt, through overwhelming cruelty and dirt, in spite of everything, the sprouts of true love, friendship, mercy are breaking through and growing stronger.  I must say that the film was very lucky with dubbing. As you know, modern censorship puts forward quite serious requirements for what sounds from big screens. Therefore, when translating paintings with an R rating, some domestic craftsmen try to throw out any more or less dubious passages, because of which the dialogues become insipid, the color and atmosphere disappear, and many jokes are simply lost. But " Ultra-Americans " pulled out a lucky ticket. Of course, swearing is prohibited in our country, but the translators have tried to preserve the obscene bite and humor of the original without breaking the law.  And there is a lot of humor in the picture, both in dialogues and visual. The scenes of fights and skirmishes were especially successful. Since Mike has absolutely no idea what to do, and has no equipment, he has to get out, using the most incredible things to kill, like a spoon, frying pan or pencil. So the action in the picture is quite original and dynamic. " Ultra-Americans " is an incredibly funny, unusual, touching and completely insane story about a stoned super agent. It can be seen that the scriptwriter and director approached the creation of the film with great imagination, using many original ideas and interesting little things. This is really one of the films about the new generation of superhumans - gone from the classics to a free voyage on a sea of crazy ideas. The Topic of Article: Funny. Touching. Ruthless. ”Ultra-American”. |
