Category Archives: Reviews

REVIEW: Get Him to the Greek

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Get Him to the Greek
Directed by: Nicholas Stoller
Written by: Nicholas Stoller & Jason Segel (screenplay)
Starring: Russell Brand, Jonah Hill, Elisabeth Moss, and Sean ‘P. Diddy’ Combs

A spin-off is a notoriously bad idea when you’re looking for quality.  You get fast cash opening weekend, and then you sink like the Titanic when people realize what you’re selling is crap.  Thankfully, this is not the case with Get Him to the Greek.

What’s great about this movie is not just its perfectly paired comic dream duo (Russell Brand and Jonah Hill), but that it only references Forgetting Sarah Marshall, the “original,” in one obligatory millisecond.  Other than that, it’s allowed to stand on its own comic footing with the funniest character from Sarah Marshall, cocky coke addict Aldous Snow.

Brand became a star partially because of this then-supporting role.  He combined his expert comedic delivery with great material very, very well.  Here he gets to shine even brighter, pulling out all the stops and even finding a soul in a modern comedy character.  I wouldn’t go so far as to say brilliant, but it’s a nice surprise.

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REVIEW: City Island

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City Island
Directed by: Raymond De Felitta
Written by: Raymond De Felitta
Starring: Andy Garcia, Alan Arkin, Julianna Margulies

Somewhere, quaintly hidden in all the bustle and busyness of New York City and the Bronx, there lies a small fishing village called City Island where the story takes place. And somewhere, quaintly hidden in all the bustle and busyness of Hollywood, there lies a small indie comedy called City Island where great laughs are harbored.

It is family melodrama at its finest, and most certainly entertaining. The film follows one family as they hide their smoking, their habits, their hobbies and their great secrets until misunderstanding after misunderstanding leads to a crescendo of  revelation and yelling. Continue reading →

REVIEW: Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time

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Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
Directed by: Mike Newell
Written by: Boaz Yakin & Doug Miro (screenplay)
Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Ben Kingsley, Gemma Arterton, and Alfred Molina

I must say, after seeing the abysmal trailer for this film, I’m somewhat pleasantly surprised with the end result.  What initially looked like another bad video game adaptation with worse graphics than the actual game, Jerry Bruckheimer has done the unthinkable: taken the (resident) evil act of adapting a movie to screen and having it actually be entertaining.  Alas, no Jack Sparrow to make this tale interesting or worth embarking on.

Bruckheimer makes a living off of these ridiculous ideas.  He grossed more than a billion dollars off of a trilogy based on a Disney ride.Though he has production credits only, you can see his swash-buckling touch all over this desert tale.  The Sex and the City girls decorate their Middle Eastern adventure with desperation mixed with luxury and a hint of American arrogance.  You’ll find no such things metastasize on the surface of this film, though they are all there behind the scenes; a dwindling economy prevails but Bruckheimer still finds $200 million for his vision.  It’s not so much arrogance as studio caution that a white male has been cast in the lead role as the Prince of Persia.

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ARCHIVE REVIEW: Crazy Heart

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Crazy Heart
Directed by: Scott Cooper
Written by: Scott Cooper (screenplay), Thomas Cobb (novel)
Starring: Jeff Bridges, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Colin Farrell, and Paul Herman

It’s not uncommon that a performance is the sole interest in a film.  Sometimes an actor or actress digs so deeply into a role that they seem born to play that it overshadows all else in the film.  This, as you can probably tell, is the case with Crazy Heart.

Jeff Bridges’ status as an underdog in Hollywood ended this year when he was awarded the Best Actor Oscar at the Academy Awards.  While the ceremony does often offer up the trophies as a career summation, sometimes the actual performance deserves it as well.  This is also the case with Bridges.  He brings to life washed-up country singer Bad Black so well that his portrayal gives this movie its depth and purpose.

First time director Scott Cooper was wise in letting his actors take a hold of his script, however lousy and mundane it may be.  For all its well intentions, the movie is boring.  By the commercial it looked like a country rehashing of The Wrestler, but Mr. Cooper is no Aronofsky.  As far as debuts go, this is underwhelming.

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REVIEW: Shrek Forever After

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Shrek Forever After
Directed by: Mike Mitchell
Written by: Josh Klausner and Darren Lemke (screenplay)
Starring: Mike Myers, Cameron Diaz, Eddie Murphy, and Antonio Banderas

Outside of Pixar, the Shrek franchise is probably the most famous digital animation escapade.  The first Shrek is widely considered a classic, an uproarious send-up of the Disney fairy tale.  The subsequent entries have all had their share of laughs, but none have matched the first one for blending heart-warming story with beautifully done satire.

The same is true with Shrek Forever After, the fourth and (they say) final installment in the series.  This one finds Shrek (Mike Myers) discontent and emasculated as the head of his new ogre family.  His first part in the movie begins with an intentionally redundant montage sequence showing the repetitiveness of his every day life with his three kids and his wife Fiona (Cameron Diaz.)

The rest of the movie follows Shrek as he pays for his discontent by making a fool’s bargain with Rumpelstiltskin (Walt Dohrn) and trades one day in his life for one day as an unhinged ogre.  The impish Stiltskin tricks him, taking back the day he was born and sending him to a world where he never existed.  From here on out, it’s a not so wonderful life.

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ARCHIVE REVIEW: Revolutionary Road

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Revolutionary Road
Directed by: Sam Mendes
Written by: Justin Haythe (screenplay), Richard Yates (novel)
Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Michael Shannon, and Kathy Bates

The way cinema portrays it, I’m led to believe absolutely no marriages of the 1950’s ended well.  With all of these shattered dreams and repressed rage foaming to the surface, it’s difficult to see how these people have time for mowing the lawn or raising the kids.

In fact, the children hardly make an appearance in Sam Mendes’ adaptation of Revolutionary Road, originally a cult novel written by Richard Yates.  They are alluded to, yes, but their most prominent function is to make Leonardo DiCaprio’s Frank Wheeler feel guilty about cheating on his wife April (Kate Winslet) on his birthday.  There he is walking into his own house, and here comes a birthday cake, a happy wife, and two smiling kids right after he got done staring ominously at the steering wheel of his car and feeling dreadful.

It’s this dreary mood of hidden secrets and suburban angst that drives much of Revolutionary Road. And though the children rarely appear, the adults do enough childish dreaming of their own.  April and Frank decide to move to Paris, an aspiration they remembered and want to achieve.

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ARCHIVE REVIEW: Wall-E

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Wall-E
Directed by: Andrew Stanton
Written by: Andrew Stanton and Jim Reardon
Starring: Ben Burtt, Fred Willard, Sigourney Weaver

He might be one of most lovable animated movie characters of all-time. Sorry Simba, Dori and Shrek, but this bot was built to love.

Wall-E is a classic animated tale with a different, more mindful approach, telling the story of a lone robot performing the selfless duty of cleaning up the mess on Earth while the human population is away on a 700 or so year cruise. The first 30 minutes of the film are silent and all the talking is left to the amazing animated work done by the Pixar team. It’s all an ode to the silent, comical works of Charlie Chapin, add fantastic color palettes and unique imagery which make this one film that doesn’t need 3D to be a visual masterpiece. Continue reading →

REVIEW: MacGruber

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MacGruber
Directed by: Jorma Taccone
Written by: Will Forte and John Solomon
Starring: Will Forte, Kristen Wiig, Ryan Phillippe and Val Kilmer

It’s important to know the context a movie was made in before you begin examining it.  Some films are made to provoke thought, others to send a message.  There are many (many!) movies made today, though, that were made purely as an entertainment and nothing else.  When you look at MacGruber that way (and only that way), it’s decent.

The star of this show is not it’s director, in fact quite the opposite.  This 90 minute feature based on a recurring 90 second sketch on Saturday Night Live is all about the script and the actors.  In fact, director Jorma Taccone over compensates immensely with what should have been a cut-and-dry directing job.  This movie is supposed to be a send-up of all things bad in 80’s action movies, and he’s given it a visual style that unintentionally mocks itself at times.  A movie such as this needs a director who can back off and let his actors fly with a script, not use artsy lighting techniques that destroy the mood.

That complaint aside, the ensemble cast is by far the highlight of this film.  I was skeptical of Will Forte’s ability to hold the screen for longer than the length of the original sketch, but he does a decent job.  There are times when you will be sitting there going “Should I laugh?” and others where you won’t be able to stop doing so.  It’s a roller coaster with a few jerks, but a welcome break from the latest Will Ferrell disaster.

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ARCHIVE REVIEW: Being John Malkovich

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Being John Malkovich
Directed by: Spike Jonze
Written by: Charlie Kaufman
Starring: John Cusack, Cameron Diaz, Catherine Keener, and John Malkovich

For fans of the work of Charlie Kaufman, a predisposition to a realm of absurdity is often acquired after watching one of his screenplays unfold.  Approach any of his works with the intention that you will be taken somewhere new, and that that place will be filled with wonder, terror, and more honesty than reality could ever contain.

In Being John Malkovich, Kaufman has crafted his magnum opus.  Inside the expansive confines of his world lie countless punchlines, absurdities and insights, most of which deal with the nature of identity.  This is a world filled only with people who go for what they want, because those who don’t don’t matter.  It’s extremes like these that guide the often childish characters through the narrative and ultimately to a conclusion that offers no simple answers.

It begins with a puppeteer named Craig Schwartz (John Cusack) realizing his dream is impossible in his own body.  He decides to apply this childish pastime onto something in the corporate world.  He gets hired as a file clerk (because of his fast fingers) on the 7 1/2 floor of a gigantic office building.  While working there, he falls immediately in love with Maxine (Catherine Keener), an attractive, manipulative, and greedy woman who leads him on, and then ultimately cuts him loose.  This is until he discovers the portal.

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REVIEW: Robin Hood

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Robin Hood
Directed by: Ridley Scott
Written by: Brian Helgeland
Starring: Russel Crowe, Cate Blanchett, Mark Strong, William Hurt

This happens just about every time an Academy Award winning team gets together to update a classic story into a big commercial success. It was the same sort of thing that happened with Alice in Wonderland earlier this year and the same sort of thing that will continue to happen when our favorite directors and actors take on a familiar unoriginal project. Disappointment. Continue reading →