Irreviews

In the Land of Women is a pretty good film.  It could have been a great film. It had electrifying young leads: the warm and charismatic Adam Brody and the fabulous Kristen Stewart [editor’s note: this was before her acting took its dramatic nose dive during the Twilight series.] It had a great story idea: a sensitive and cute-as-hell stud just dumped by his girlfriend skips out on his frustrating life to stay with his grandmother, and becomes emotionally embroiled with the women of the family across the street. Seriously, what could be better? It really should have been an American version of Eric Rohmer’s Conte D’Été. Everything was in place.

Except that Eric Rohmer didn’t write it. If you ever want to appreciate how just how great Eric Rohmer was, a good way to find out is to compare these two very similar films. Land of Women is a nice little film, to be sure. It’s enjoyable, but it lacks all depth; indeed, it never even strives for any depth. The three main characters are never developed beyond their tantalizing initial sketches, and their relationships to each other are strangely skirted around. Instead, the movie busies itself serving up a safe but banal stew of subplots – a Sunday-night-movie cancer subplot, a shallow unrequited teenage love subplot, and a tiresome “young man connects with grandmother” subplot, around which the main characters revolve, occasionally bumping into each other. The film has it all backward, as far as I’m concerned!

The first half of the film is intriguing, mainly because Brody and Stewart have an unusual, almost Rohmeresque chemistry between them, and their story seems to have a lot of possibilities. They are both convincingly lost and self-centered, with Stewart playing her semi-conscious attraction to Brody quite well, and Brody playing his non-specific neediness quite well also. If only Kasdan had written some serious dialog for these two! Instead we are just teased, and then left hanging when the “frustrated mother” plot suddenly takes over the film half-way through, and the “fragile, troubled daughter” plot is summarily dumped. This decision was a shame, because the Brody/Ryan relationship is not nearly as emotionally compelling – I’m not sure if this is a result of Meg Ryan’s lame acting and extraterrestrial appearance, or if the writing in their scenes is simply boring – a bit of both, I think. But with the narrative high ground surrendered, the film mundanely grinds through to its conclusion, having squandered every opportunity that was there for the taking.

There is a third woman in the picture, two of them actually. Brody’s ex-girlfriend is a nothing character. But the younger daughter, who develops a childish crush on Brody, is actually a pretty good character in the beginning, played with warmth and skill by Mekenzie Vega. But then Kasdan can’t think of anything for her to do and she just disappears into the cancer subplot as the “worried daughter.”

In the Land of Women also makes two huge mistakes. The hackneyed comedy associated with the grandmother (Olympia Dukakas) was very distracting and unnecessary – Kasdan just needed the courage not stoop to that kind of device out of fear. And secondly, the casting of Meg Ryan was a really unfortunate decision. Her face should have gotten separate billing over the rest of her, because it has become its own life form. Seriously, she no longer looks like a real person, and in a film like this you simply cannot have that. Plus, she’s not a good enough actress to pull off her role – her breakdown scene is pretty pathetic, for example, and if Adam Brody was not standing opposite her looking young and gorgeous it would have been a disaster.

I enjoyed In the Land of Women for what it was, don’t get me wrong. It’s not a bad film at all. But when such a compelling confluence of story and actors occurs, it’s hard to not be overwhelmed with disappointment when it’s carelessly frittered away.

This is a really good “movie of the week” about mental affliction – maybe the most enjoyable I’ve ever seen. But that’s all it is.

This is not meant as a damning criticism, mind you. I enjoyed Adam, and I must say I have enjoyed very few films this year. It’s a good little film, straightforward and a bit sad. And it seems pretty honest about the tough realities of Asberger syndrome.

Hugh Dancy is fast becoming one of my favorite actors, and his performance is so good it is the only time I have ever actually liked the afflicted character in one of these “affliction movies.” The problem is that by the very nature of the character he is playing he is rather limited in terms of the emotion he can directly bring to the movie. The overall warmth and emotional resonance of the story falls to Rose Byrne, who unfortunately is a soulless widget. Even so, Hugh Dancy is SO good that he makes Rose Byrne look almost decent.

Go see it! It’s probably better than 90% of the crap out there right now. It’s just not the kind of film you will necessarily be adding to your collection and watching on a regular basis.

I don’t even know where to begin with this deeply disappointing film. I love the first 5 Potter films. They are warm, fun, endearing, well-written, exciting, with fabulous actors all around. They kept getting better, culminating in Order of the Phoenix, which shared many of the superb structural qualities of classic 1970’s political thrillers – high praise indeed! And the series was and is a unique event to be sure, with the child actors aging precisely with the story over seven years – there certainly is no  room for screw-ups.

But for some reason, someone decided that this rock-solid formula should be radically changed for Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. Why? Allow me to speculate:

After a disappointing showing by Harry Potter 5, a terrible economy, and faced with making the weakest book of the series into the next movie, the film makers panicked and brought in a market research consulting firm to tell them what to do. What follows is a leaked memo (probably internal, judging by the informal and somewhat unprofessional tone of it) outlining suggestions to the film makers for changes in approach to be considered for Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince.

– – – – –

Memo: Recommendations for Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince

Recommended cost-cutting measures:

• Use cheaper CGI. Cover it up by shooting the film through maximal gray filter and distorting the images slightly, producing a fat, monochromatic effect reminiscent of certain styles of cartoon animation. No one will notice the down-grade.
  
• Stop having the Aurors move around in white smoke – that’ll save half the smoke costs.
• Cut back on set dressing for Hogwarts. No one cares if it looks fake or real. Dump the moving stairs, moving paintings, etc.
• Recycle the 20 year old set-dressing from Superman’s lair for the cave scene at the end of the movie.
• Dump the elves, they’re expensive, unattractive, and kind of annoying
  
• Cut the Dursleys – they’re unnecessary and they’re FUGLY – they aren’t helping anything.
  
• Cut all “continuity” actors, like Fudge, Trelawney, Umbridge, Moody, Cho, Myrtle, the little dweeb that was in Harry’s self defense class in 5, anyone that can go, goes. Keep the midget, though – people like that kind of thing.
  

Other suggestions:

Throw the Harry/Hermionie pairing at the audience constantly; this is your best bet to generate interest. Make the audience think they’re going to get it on. Scenes of them snuggling and touching tenderly. Have Ron and Lavender walk in on them snuggling. Have Dumbledore ask Harry about his love life, something like “I’ve been noticing you and Hermionie, Heh, Heh, Heh …”

< hand-written annotation in margin:  If Gambon complains that Dumbledore is suddenly acting totally silly and out of character, FUCK him. After this film he’s gone, so who cares what he thinks.>

Dump the lame-ass robes. Dress the kids “sexy-cool”, like Generation-X hipsters from Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Use these images in the movie advertisements too.

The people watching this film are not wizards! Put in more real people – people need to see themselves in order to be interested. Have Harry pick up a hot black chick in a coffee shop. (Have Dumbledore say something about her like “well done, mate!”) And add scenes of London being destroyed by deatheaters, maybe a bridge buckling, like Golden Gate in an earthquake, thousands of NORMAL people dying. People will really respond to this – THIS is what they want to see!

In Dumbledore’s opening speech to Hogwarts, have him say something like “the enemy’s greatest weapon is YOU”, to conjure a post Nine-Eleven, “if you see something, say something” paranoia in the audience – the terrorism angle will make them more interested.

Invent a scene where the Wealesy House is attacked, to provide an opportunity to show Mr. and Mrs. Weasley looking like complete losers – will support Harry/Hermionie angle (Hermionie marry into THAT family?!). Have Mr. Weasley say something really pathetic like “Molly never leaves the house anymore.” Have Lupin and Tonks there, acting like they need psychiatric hospitalization; At the end, they should all be staring helplessly, watching their house burn, like Pale Rider.

Do a Blair Witch thing, like invent a scene where Harry and Ginny bolt into a pitch black corn field and get trapped by evil people. This will excite the audience – wake them up, if you will.

Research suggests people really like Bellatrix. Have more scenes of her, acting crazy. It does not matter if they make sense in the narrative.

Tell that Malfoy kid to lose weight. He should look like a Hollister dude.

Abandon the casting of Tom Riddle from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Cast a kid that looks and acts like Damien Omen instead, so the audience will get that he’s evil. And add a line like “I can hurt people who are bad to me,” just to be sure that they don’t miss the fact that he is evil.

Similarly, have Lucius Malfoy’s wife have streaks of black in her hair, so that people know she’s evil.

Emphasize Luna’s ditsy behavior. Have her dress in totally outrageous clothes (think Ugly Betty) and limit her utterances to comic nonsense. Make her the “dumb blond” – people love films with a dumb blond.

Minimize Neville and Hagrid as much as possible – polling suggests that at this point they are subtracting more then they are adding.

Imply a pedophilia angle to Slughorn’s “collecting” of students; have a scene with Dumbledore and Harry talking with each other (without looking at each other, implying shame) about Harry allowing himself to “be collected,”  with the subtext that Dumbledore wants Harry to let Slughorn fuck him. Implicit taboo will excite audience.

Have Ginny macking on a “big black guy” in public, with Harry watching – plays on white paranoid inferiority issues, which generates sympathy for Harry.

Do not show Ron and Hermionie kissing or touching – it will screw up the Harry/Hermionie angle. Have lots of scenes with Ron acting REALLY unattractively. Have him say a series of really stupid things, like “the thing about unbreakable vows is that you can’t break them”, things like that, so he’ll come across as a complete buffoon.

Do not have Harry and Ginny get together. Instead, just have a secret (and ambiguous) sexual encounter between them that leaves open the possibility that she might eventually become his back-door biaach.

When Snape cures Malfoy of Sectum Sempra, do NOT use “Episkey” as is done in the book. Instead, have him utter rhythmic Latin nonsense over and over, a la Eyes Wide Shut. This will subconsciously conjure the image of an “Eyes Wide Shut orgy” at Hogwarts.

Cut Dumbledore’s funeral. Instead, have all the wizards do a “Nine-Eleven / 1000 points of light” thing – this will link the deatheaters to Islamic terrorists in people’s minds, injecting emotion into Dumbledore’s death.

At the very end, have Harry and Hermionie standing side by side, looking like a gorgeous couple destined for procreation, with an ugly, defeated Ron stooped over in the background. This will send the right message to the audience about what to expect in the next film.

– – – – – –

Unfortunately, the film makers followed ALL of this advice. It’s a sad day for Potter fans, and makes me wonder what on earth they have in store for book 7.

Mamma Mia is obviously very light fair. There’s no need to see it if you don’t like ABBA songs, and even if you do you should also not have anything against silly musicals with almost no story. This film makes Grease look like the Brothers Karamazov.

When I saw Mamma Mia on Broadway, I really didn’t care for it very much. I didn’t hate it, but it just left me a little cold. I thought the story was dumb and that the ABBA songs, while undeniably great as pop songs, really didn’t work as Broadway numbers, no matter how earnestly they tried to make them work. I saw Mamma Mia the movie at an outdoor showing of the film’s sing-a-long version. I enjoyed it immensely and can report that they fixed a lot of the problems with the musical version.

First: Meryl Streep. I am not a Meryl Streep fan. But this is a side of Meryl Streep that is not on film very much. Not only can she sing, she is quite musical in her delivery of these fantastic ABBA songs. Her lip syncing (to her own voice) is fabulous and very convincing. Plus she is relaxed, loose, funny, silly, happy, and has never looked more beautiful in her life. You could fall in LOVE with Meryl Steep watching this movie. And I have to hand it to her: it really takes something to lip sync  “The Winner Takes It All” to Pierce Brosnan, on a rocky Mediterranean coastline, in the middle of a hammed-up movie musical based entirely on corny pop songs, and have it basically work.

Second: The Men. In the musical, the three fathers were just generic actors. Here, they are they warm and attractive stars with great voices: Stellan Skarsgard, Peirce Brosnan, and Colin Firth. Their star presence alone just smooths over the minimalist storyline and makes it palatable, so you can get on with enjoying the main point of the film (to listen to ABBA songs, of course.) But they also each approach their minimally-written roles with great warmth, care and naturalness. They must of had a ton of fun doing this film to bring this much genuine warmth to these roles.

(I might add that Christine Baranski – who really is a Broadway singer – and Julie Walters are terrific too. Amanda Seyfried is tolerable in a generic Disney kind of way. )

Third: The singing. As far as I could tell (the sound was not ideal at this outdoor venue,) under most of the songs they snuck in a backing track of either the original ABBA voices, or voices very similar to the original ABBA voices.  This corrected a big problem with the musical, which was that the ABBA songs sounded weird being sung by single individuals in a Broadway context, especially since those songs are SO tied to the unique blended vocal sound of the two ABBA singers. Here, the songs frequently wind up sounding like the original ABBA songs (which is good!)

Pierce Brosnan has to sing a quite a bit, and he struggles quite a bit. He can sort of carry a tune, but he is not very musical. However, the whole thing is so winning that by the end I found myself tolerating Brosnan’s “Tom Waits on a dream day” singing style.

Lastly: The visuals: You never get tired of looking at the beautiful location where all this action takes place. Plus, the film-makers were free to lapse into movie montages in the middle of the songs, and I can tell you this makes all the difference in terms of how they go down on screen.

The film starts a little slowly, but I quickly found myself actually liking the silly story, and enjoying each ABBA number more than the last.

I’m not sure if this film actually has repeat watchability, but if you like ABBA and you like silly musicals with happy up-beat stories, I strongly encourage you to give it a try. In its own way, it really is rather brilliant.

I love the story concept of Nick and Nora, and it is not un-enjoyable, I suppose (how’s that for a non-endorsement endorsement?) It has its moments, and it is cute and very earnest which tends to smooth over its problems a bit. It also opens fairly strongly, which helps sustain it. The fact that the critics gave this worse reviews that Zack & Miri is basically a joke.

But the overall story arc is just not worked out adequately, and the dialog is all over the place: sometimes quirky and funny, sometimes downright dull. Plus, you never see the lead characters bond over their love of music; this is highly problematic because the whole relationship is supposed to spring from Kat Denning’s feelings about Michael Cera’s mix tapes that she “saves” and listens to after they are summarily discarded by her friend, the bitchy object of Cera’s affections. I also did not believe for one second that Michael Cera would be in a band with three sexually crazed gay guys.

Michael Cera is developing an alarming new tic: he is now channeling Mark Ruffalo’s weirdest and most unattractive facial expressions. This is not a good career move for him, in my opinion. I hope he doesn’t think he is maturing his acting in any way by doing so.

Kat Dennings, on the other hand, seems to be showing the effects of the Jennifer Connelly school of acting: deliver all your lines looking down at the ground. This works for Jennifer Connelly because … well, she looks like Jennifer Connelly. But I have not yet formed an opinion on how well this approach works for Kat Dennings – it’s a bit mixed, really.

It’s not a bad little film, but it doesn’t really work very well, and is a little dull.

I do not understand the Seth Rogan industry. What is the appeal of this loosely connected collection of films by Rogan, Judd Apatow, and now Kevin Smith, all of which have plots born from a 7th grade boys locker room and feature as a centerpiece Seth Rogan playing his ugly, disgusting, boring self.

From what I can tell, this industry originated with two films, 40 Year Old Virgin and Knocked Up, which were a cut above those that followed because they were  elevated by charismatic, attractive and talented central stars (Steve Carell, Katherine Heigl,) as well as the strong supporting presence of Paul Rudd. The funny parts from those films had NOTHING to do with Rogan. Yet somehow the industry rolls on with Seth Rogan front and center.

First off, suffice it to say there is no Katherine Heigl in this film. Elizabeth Banks is not the kind of actress that’s going to distract you from Seth Rogan, or by her mere presence elevate really idiotic material. So obviously this is problem number one.

And it truly is idiotic!!! Zack and Miri strikes me as DESPERATELY unfunny. Blacks and Arabs mindlessly hurling racial epithets at each other? Granny Panties? Testicle humor? Give me a break, this shit is so old! And poop jokes? Was that ever funny? Is Kevin Smith a retarded 4th grader trapped in a man’s body?  The scene where Banks hits on her old high school crush at the reunion is some of the most painful comic writing I’ve experienced in a long time. The only one in the whole film who seems at all at home uttering this wretched material is (surprise, surprise) Seth Rogan, hero of submoronic tween boys worldwide.

I cut this abomination off just after they (finally) decided to make the porno film. I am confident from what I did see of the film that I missed nothing by doing so. Do yourselves a favor and cut it off before you even rent it.

I saw a screening of this film at the Omega Institute this summer. It is a remarkable film by Jamie Catto and Duncan Bridgeman who comprise the “group” 1 Giant Leap. The film is 20% interview footage with various celebrities and celebrity social commentators (Deepak Chopra, Noam Chomsky, Eckhart Tolle, etc.) talking about the miserable fucked up state of the world and people in it, and what we need to do about it to make things better – basically, to stop being so fucking selfish and start helping other people. The other 80% is a music video extravaganza, shot all over the world, with people remotely collaborating on songs, many different songs, people singing in slums of India, African tribal villages, etc. etc.. It’s rather remarkable really, and some of the music is really good.

I’m writing this review even though this film is not in distribution in the states, to do my part in helping to bring it here. It’s overall message is one of togetherness and hope, and music as a common bond between all mankind. The sentiments expressed by the interviewers are pretty basic. For example, anyone the slightest bit familiar with Noam Chomsky will absolutely be familiar with his views on why people in free societies like America are SO controlled by propaganda. But as a vehicle to reach beyond the already convinced, the film might be a very powerful tool. And it is still good to hear these basic views collected together and united or bound as it were by the common context of music and human collaboration.

The only disappointing section was the section on death, which I thought was rather unenlightened and depressing; other might disagree and find it very truthful and poignant, I’m not sure. But other than that, the film was thought-provoking, fun, entertaining, and displayed a rather bold vision. It great to see people really using art to try to make a difference.

The web site for 1 Giant Leap and the film is

http://www.whataboutme.tv

I hope you get a chance to see this interesting film!

First, Mike Tyson in a film is never a good idea. Second, the premise – that what these guys did is somehow all okay, normal and understandable – is revolting. Third, the comic timing of the actors is clunky,  and the comedy dialog writing ( “we’re so fuckin fucked!” ) leaves a lot to be desired. Four, they rely too much on Seth Rogan-type physical abuse shit and potty-humor for laughs. Five, the Zach G character is really just a disgusting human being, one of the most disgusting, loathsome human beings I have seen in films in a long time; that I am expected to like him and find him funny is deeply offensive to me.  Six, the Chinese gangster is the second most loathsome individual I’ve seen in films in a long time. Seven, both Zach G and the Chinese gangster are UGLY motherfuckers – it hurts to look at them. Eight, the Chinese gangster has the most irritating way of speaking of any character in the history of cinema. Nine, the “love” story between the dentist and Heather Graham is totally pathetic. Ten, the series of pictures in the ending credits is really depressing and sad and leaves you with little hope that the human race is destined for survival.