JUNEBUG (DVD)

Director: Phil Morrison (no major film work)
Starring: Amy Adams, Embeth Davidtz, Benjamin McKenzie, Alessandro Nivolla

Junebug is an excellent, if ambiguous, portrayal of family ties and conflicts. It’s a small film with a small budget, and even though it might have small goals in mind, they’re intriguingly conceived. Maybe “small” is not the right word for this story’s themes. Maybe light, or common would be a better description. The plot follows a young man in the big city as he gets married to a highbrow, hipster art dealer. Six months later they manage to find the time to introduce the girl to his southern middle class family. Comedy and confusion ensues as each character’s personal goals conflicts with all of the others. I think that the film tries not to take sides in this argument, showing the selfishness of the city folks and the lonely unhappiness of most of the country folks. There are enough characters covering a broad enough range of human emotions that everyone should find someone to connect with here.

In my opinion this ambiguity is both the film’s greatest strength and perhaps its main weakness. The movie shows flaws and triumphs in almost every character. That’s nice and allows for a broader understanding of the situations, but I think maybe that it might just be a bit of a cop out. A story that says we’re all okay and all flawed at the same time can be a nice change from the normal background voices in society screaming how they’re right and everyone else is wrong. At the same time, some people really are more right than others. Deciphering and defining those distinctions is what separates the best art, or so methinks.

So, this is a very good, very entertaining, very enlightening film. On the other hand it never really seemed to make any statements at all. That’s hard. It’s either wishy-washy, or it’s powerfully complex. I’ll place it somewhere in the middle. However, there is no doubt that it’s interesting and unique enough to receive a good grade as a film.

Standouts: Strong tone and style of story.
Blowouts: Not much to really complain about here.

Grade: A-

1/27/2006

WEDDING CRASHERS

Director: David Dobkin (Shanghai Knights, Clay Pigeons)
Starring: Vince Vaughn, Owen Wilson, Rachel McAdams, Isla Fisher

It’s the rare comedy that really strikes me as funny. That’s why I was particularly surprised that 3 excellent comedies would come out in such quick succession. The Aristocrats was funny. 40-Year-Old Virgin was hilarious. Wedding Crashers was somewhere in between. Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn have made a number of comedies, and are quite good at it. I personally think this is the best work for either of them to date. There were moments of this film that I couldn’t stop laughing, and there are a host of lines to remember. My only regret is that the film finished on a bit of a whimper. Will Ferrell (who I normally enjoy in a cheesy sort of way) made a late appearance, but unfortunately didn’t fit into the story very well. For the first 60 to 80 minutes, though, this was an extraordinarily funny flick.

Standouts: Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson, two funny guys.
Blowouts: Will Ferrell’s late insertion into the film just didn’t work.

Grade: A-

9/3/2005

40 YEAR OLD VIRGIN

Director: Judd Apatow (Producer The Cable Guy, Anchorman: Ron Burgundy ...)
Starring: Steve Carell, Catherine Keener, Paul Rudd, Seth Rogan


Steve Carell, of The Daily Show ‘fame’, moved into the role of leading man with this comic vehicle of his own construction. It works. It works well. In fact, this was one of the funniest films in recent memory. Oh, it’s not as quotable as Office Space, and not as laugh out loud crowd pleasing as Something About Mary, but it’s certainly a hilarious piece of work. I laughed throughout. I felt good leaving the theater. The script is smart enough to not treat its characters like assholes. Despite being a sex comedy with a nerd for a main character, it’s still a sweet, reaffirming (and funny) story.

Standouts: Steve Carell & Company are simply hilarious.
Blowouts: I can’t think of a single major “failure” in the film.

Grade: A-

8/26/2005

THE ARISTOCRATS

Director: Paul Provenza (Long time stand up comedian)
Starring: Documentary (Penn Jillette does much of the interviewing)

A documentary by stand-up comics, nominally about stand-up comics. The hook on this film is the joke “The Aristocrats”. A family comes into a talent agent’s office and says, “Have we got an act for you!” They proceed to shit, fuck, piss, vomit and revel in obscenity for a while. The agent says, “That’s quite an act. What’s it called?” The answer: The Aristocrats! It’s a so-so joke. Really, I’m sure that Paul Provenza and Penn Jillette just thought that comedians being truly profane for 90 minutes would sell tickets. He’s probably right. I’ve heard that this film is a compelling deconstruction of stand-up comedy, and perhaps that’s true to a degree. We see a hundred different takes on the same material. I don’t know. In the end, I think it’s just a funny movie. I laughed throughout. I found it slightly less funny than a good stand-up routine, but being a stand-up fan, that’s praise on my part. The standout routines include Kevin Pollack telling the joke while doing a Christopher Walken impersonation, Bob Sagat in perhaps the dirtiest telling of the routine, and a hilarious mime routine of the joke. I didn’t find this to be an amazingly enlightening film, but I did find it to be a damn funny one.

Standouts: Kevin Pollack, Bob Sagat, Gilbert Godfried, Billy the Mime.
Blowouts: Although a lot of comedians were flat, I found Jon Stewart to be annoying.

Grade: B+

8/10/2005

AFTER THE SUNSET (DVD)

Director: Brett Ratner (Rush Hour I & II, Red Dragon)
Starring: Pierce Brosnan, Selma Hayek, Woody Harrelson, Naomie Harris

Brosnan has had a lot of success with spy and master thief movies recently. The Bond films have made his name in this regard, but I was a much bigger fan of both the Tailor of Panama and The Thomas Crown Affair. I found both of these to be extraordinarily fun films. This film doesn’t measure up to either of those successes, but it is in its own right a satisfying little thief film. The tone of the story is extremely lighthearted with a fair amount of humor mixed in with a couple of complicated thefts. The story works on this fun, humorous level. Actually, I wish they would have gone further in that direction than they did.

The plot, despite a few holes, is solid. Brosnan and Hayek are a team of thieves after a series of three famous diamonds. They steal the first two, humiliating a certain FBI agent in the process (Harrelson). They then retire to the Bahamas to live the sweet life. Coincidentally, the third diamond soon goes on display in the Bahamas. Harrelson follows it and ends up in a series of wacky adventures with the thieves. The heart of the movie lies in the fun relationship between the four main characters while they spar back and forth. I really hoped they were going to end up joining forces in some way in the end. I wish they would have. I think it would have been a better story if they had.

Regardless, the film was successful as it was. Everybody seemed to be having a good time living it up in the lush Caribbean sun. Every set was gorgeous and Salma Hayek was extraordinarily beautiful in bikinis throughout. This will probably end up being a bit of a throwaway movie, but I definitely enjoyed it while I was watching it.

Standouts: Harrelson as the comic relief, lush beautiful locales, and a fun script.
Blowouts: A few plot holes in the thefts and twisting portion of the story.

Grade: B

12/19/2005