The P.T. Barnum of Hollywood seems finally ready to leave the flea circus behind and start making actual films. I, for one, am ready to see the director behind the hype.
Up until this point, I have been cold to J.J. Abrams and any of his projects. They all have the whiff of gimmick about them. He has seemed, in his relatively short career, as a younger, hipper version of P.T. Barnum, desperately seeking to outmarket everyone else in the Hollywood circus. His television shows have been the best examples of his worst instinct. 'Felicity' was designed with an annoying bookend device that allowed for narration throughout the show. 'Alias' saw Abrams pioneering the mystery plotting that became more famous later in his hit series 'Lost'. While supporters of 'Lost' claim that Abrams has an end in sight, it's fairly clear that most of this stuff is made up as the show continues, cleverly stringing the viewers along on a rapidly evaporating mystery. Remember the last few seasons of 'The X-Files' Then came 'Cloverfield', which was a marketing campaign in search of a movie. Like 'The Blair Witch Project', the marketing for 'Cloverfield' was so saturated and so mysterious that the film could never really match the hype. Even though I moderately enjoyed the final film, I have never had the desire to rewatch it. It was an event motion picture rather than an actual motion picture. In reality, it was all just a bunch of Slusho. So far, the closest Abrams has come to distilling a complete and true entertainment experience - one devoid of gimmicks - was 'Mission Impossible 3'. While it was not difficult to outdo the horrible second film in the unnecessary trilogy, Abrams managed to increase the sense of danger and create a palpable tension. It also ushered in the unfortunate hand-held camera technique that has almost ruined action films in the last decade. Abrams' newest project is a shiny reimagining of 'Star Trek'. As I have said before, I am not a fan of the universe in any of its versions. From all accounts, it looks like Abrams has managed to do the impossible, namely, to inject some actual life into what is intrinsically a boring and dramatically inert concept. And he's done it without the gimmicks! More than ever before, Abrams is pulling back his 'Wizard Of Oz' curtain and allowing fans to hear his thoughts more directly. He has done several keen and lively interviews for the press surrounding 'Star Trek's' impending release. Most interesting to me is this one conducted by Charlie Rose recently. Check it out: Abrams now has some very clear ideas about how to approach character development that he certainly did not have when he collaborated with Michael Bay on 'Armageddon'. He's also warm and engaging and quite funny. So far, he has shown a predilection for huge blockbuster entertainment. Hopefully he can take that intellect and style and use it on more personal projects, and not just the next flea circus. But for now, I'm warming up to the guy a little more.