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Kissing Summer Roberts

12 Sep

Michael, the character Zach Braff plays in The Last Kiss, has a pretty sweet life, and he knows it.

He’s got a good job, great friends, and a beautiful girlfriend named Jenna (Jacinda Barrett) who loves him and who is carrying their child.

But Jenna wants to get married and buy a house, so Michael is getting antsy and nervous about the way his life is not just inching but sprinting toward more responsibility. Wasn’t it just yesterday that he was a twentysomething and didn’t have a care in the world? Now Michael is about to turn 30 and adulthood responsibilities await. Continue reading →

Weekend Winners and Losers

27 Aug

Winner: The Office, for winning the Emmy for Best Comedy Series, and My Name Is Earl, for winning awards for writing and directing
Loser: The rest of the show. Aside from Conan’s opening, it was a snooze.

Loser: Ari Gold
Winner: Jeremy Piven

Loser: The Red Sox. Still. They should just stop playing. I mean actually stop playing. It was painful last weekend, but now it’s just an agonizingly slow crawl to October.
Winner: Me, because I didn’t watch any of it

Winner: Saturday’s weather
Loser: Sunday’s weather

Winner: My eyes. I had an opthamologist appointment on Saturday and got some new glasses.
Loser: Rims. My new glasses have none.

Loser: Snakes on a Plane. Why isn’t anyone seeing this movie??
Winner: Everyone who did see Snakes on a Plane. I still say I’d pay to see it again.

Winner: The weekend. It was relaxing and good.
Loser: The weekend. Too short, as always.

Snakes in a Movie Theater!

23 Aug

Best news story I heard today:
Rattlers Freed in Snakes on a Plane Theater Prank

PHOENIX (Reuters) — Life imitating art is all very well. Unless, that is, it’s a movie about deadly snakes on the rampage.
Movie chain AMC Entertainment Inc. said pranksters at one of its Phoenix theaters released two live diamondback rattlesnakes during a showing of the film Snakes on a Plane last Friday. No one was injured…. (read the rest here)

A local video report on the story is here.

This is perhaps the only thing that could have made the movie more enjoyable for me. I love this story!

Movie Review on My Blog

19 Aug

I have to admit, I had one of the best moviegoing experiences of the year when I went to see Snakes on a Plane on Saturday. I mean, sure, the guys in the back row who were hissing all through the movie (including the trailers) and who were trying to do a call-and-response cheer of “Snakes!” “On a Plane!” before it started became a little much, but really, this is a totally fun movie that completely lives up to the hype and is actually worth seeing.

And if you see it with the right kind of crowd, as I did, one that was totally into it (and I, personally, was quite excited to see the movie), you’ll like it even more. Continue reading →

You Da Man

19 Aug

Trust the Man is an amiable comedy about two couples going through rough patches. One is married with two children, the other unmarried but together for seven years.

Not sure what else the movie is about because basically, all that really happens is things get bad, and then pretty quickly they get better. It’s all a little too pat. Continue reading →

Not So Magical

17 Aug

I won’t spend much time writing about The Illusionist because I don’t expect it to stay around in theaters all that long anyway.

Basically, despite a typically good performance by Paul Giamatti and a typically intense one by Ed Norton — and a surprisingly decent one by Jessica Biel — I found the movie lacking in (please excuse the obvious pun) magic.

Hopefully The Prestige, another movie about magicians, will be more enjoyable. It certainly looks better.

In the meantime, The Illusionist gets a B- from me.

Happy Happy, Joy Joy

14 Aug

I believe it’s Kaplan‘s second law of moviemaking that states: “Never bet against a talking animal picture.” Well, consider it law 2A that you shouldn’t bet against a movie where the animals also sing and dance, and where one animal has the speaking voice of Robin Williams. If that’s the type of movie that appeals to you, then waste no time heading over to the web site for Happy Feet and watch the three trailers (in the “video”) section. Aside from featuring some truly amazing animation, these trailers promise a really great and funny movie. I mean, I don’t even know what this movie is all about, but already I’m dying to see it. I mean, really. Just try to find something more entertaining than a penguin with Robin Williams’ voice singing “My Way” in Spanish — complete with back-up singers. Just try it. But watch these trailers first. Or, if you have a really good Internet connection, click here to watch in high-definition Quicktime video. (Trailer two is the one you want.)

Towering Achievement

10 Aug

Not that we needed reminding, but 9/11 was a really shitty day. In his new film World Trade Center, Oliver Stone revists the chaos, fear, hysteria, heartbreak, sadness, and destruction of that day, but in the process pays effective tribute to those who lived through it.

In the early moments of WTC, Stone shows how 9/11 started out like any other day. People are going to work, streets are filled with commuters, and all is business as usual. But then the shadow of a plane is seen moving across a building, elsewhere there’s a strong tremor, and suddenly nothing is the same. We all know what happened next, but Stone dramatizes it, recreating the events with a you-are-there quality, and showing us what it was like to look up in shock and see the towers on fire. We’ve not wanted to know how it must have felt to be in the World Trade Center when the towers fell, but there we are with John McLaughlin (Nicolas Cage) and his men experiencing it, and feeling scared just waiting for the inevitable doom that awaits.

Without going too much into a wordy review, I’ll say that the movie maintains the same perspective throughout. Though they get their due, this is not a movie that celebrates those who rescued McLaughlin and Jimez (Michael Pena). Instead, this is a more personal film about those trapped NYPD officers, and we feel like we’re trapped right there with them. Above ground, there’s some fantastic acting by Maria Bello as McLaughlin’s wife (Maggie Gyllenhaal is also good as Jimenez’s wife), and in general, though the film is at times hard to watch and runs over two hours long, it still moves at a good pace.

There were many stories of heroism, courage, and strength that came out of 9/11. WTC tells just one of them. McLaughlin and Jimenez are no more special than many others who lived through the day, but it’s that quality that makes this film so good. Stone illustrates how it’s not those larger-than-life heroes who deserve all the attention. Appropriately, this is a film for the little guy. It’s an excellent tribute. I give it an A.

A Real Winner

6 Aug

People ask me all the time if I’ve seen any good movies lately. (I guess they’re not regular readers of my blog.)

For a while, I couldn’t really say “yes” with much confidence.

That changes today.

Little Miss Sunshine is a very good movie, the best one I’ve seen in a very long while.

If you’ve never heard of Little Miss Sunshine, it’s the story of a dysfunctional family on a road trip taking the 7-year-old daughter to participate in a beauty pageant. Continue reading →

I Don’t Hear Anything

5 Aug

The Night Listener has a really interesting premise: Gabriel Noone, a depressed radio host, develops a phone relationship with a young, sexually-abused boy and his foster mother, but comes to doubt that the boy actually exists after a few too many things don’t add up. Unfortunately, that’s about all it has. Despite a decent performance by Robin Williams, the film doesn’t really go anywhere (not counting Wisconsin). Instead, you sit there waiting for something to happen and nothing really ever does. So, I’m giving The Night Listener a C.

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