Posts tagged married
“The Five-Year Engagement” More Like the Five-Year Movie
0May 5, 2012
“More Like the Five-Year Movie”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
The Five-Year Engagement was made by the same people who made the 2008 Forgetting Sarah Marshall, and so it must be good, right?
Well, yes and no. Yes, it is good in some places, and no, it is not good in other places, mainly the scenes that go on for too long and the scenes that should have been cut in the first place.
Jason Segal and Emily Blunt star as Tom and Violet. They met a year ago at a New Year’s Eve party, which we keep seeing in flashbacks at various times throughout the movie.
They get engaged, and during a meeting with Tom’s relatives to plan the engagement party, one of the men comments that the men will all be wearing yarmulkes, of course. Violet says to Tom that he doesn’t have a yarmulke, and he replies that he does and, “It’s in my Jewish drawer.”
The story begins in San Francisco, and you can guess from the title that the engagement isn’t going to go smoothly, right?
Correct. Violet is working on her doctorate in psychology, and she gets accepted to a position at the University of Michigan, which will take two years to complete.
However, because Tom is a chef in a restaurant, he says that he can always find a job anywhere, and so they decide that Tom will move to Michigan with Violet, and they will postpone the wedding for two years.
I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, couldn’t they get married in San Francisco before moving to Michigan, or couldn’t they even get married in Michigan?
But if they did that, then the filmmakers would have to change the title of the movie, wouldn’t they?
Well, you can guess from the title that the two-year plan isn’t going to go smoothly, either, right? Violet’s work at the University of Michigan gets extended, and I don’t want to spoil anything, but at one point the situation gets so bad that it looks like there won’t be any wedding at all.
Now, you know how the DVD version of some movies contains deleted scenes? Maybe the DVD of this movie will thankfully be missing some scenes that should have been cut.
The Five-Year Engagement lives up to its reputation of being a comedy, but it is more like the five-year movie.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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“Think Like a Man” Is Funny, but Predictable
0April 28, 2012
“Funny, but Predictable”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Think Like a Man has so many characters in it that at first it is difficult to tell who is who and who is dating whom, and then by the time you do figure it out, the movie is over.
The title comes from a real book written by comedian Steve Harvey that became a best seller in 2009 and was titled Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man and had the subtitle of “What Men Really Think about Love, Relationships, Intimacy and Commitment.”
It was an advice book for women written by a man, and it plays an important part in this movie, which is a comedy, and Harvey himself appears throughout the movie talking about the book on a daytime talk show and then again from time to time giving advice straight to the audience.
The story follows a number of men and women who are dating each other, the men are all friends with each other, and their group also includes one man who is getting a divorce and another man who is happily married.
When one of the men says at the beginning of the movie, “Life is great, Fellows, may it never change,” we in the audience can predict that it is going to change, and it might not be so great for them, either.
You see, the women in the movie discover the advice book, they all read it, and they start manipulating the men they are dating in order to make the men do what the women want.
Now, the men aren’t so easily manipulated, because they are men, after all, but when they discover that the women they are dating are all reading the book and using its advice to try to change the men, the men all read the book, too, and try to use its advice to their own advantage.
And that is what makes this movie a comedy, because things don’t always work out as planned when you try to change someone.
Here are just two of the women’s situations.
One woman has been going out with a man for nine years, and she decides that she is going to require him to propose to her.
Another woman has a son and she is dating a mama’s boy.
Think Like a Man is funny, but predictable.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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“Salmon Fishing in the Yemen” Makes the Impossible Possible
0April 7, 2012
“Making the Impossible Possible”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Salmon Fishing in the Yemen is a love story, and I don’t mean the love that fishermen have for fishing, although there is also that.
On the other hand, Steven Wright says in his act, “There is a fine line between fishing and just standing on the shore looking like an idiot.”
In this movie, the comment is made that the only thing that fishermen care about is fish, and that they are patient and virtuous.
The fishermen, of course, are patient and virtuous, not the fish.
No, we should remember that fish are so dumb that they can’t tell the difference between a real fly and an artificial fly with a hook in it at the end of a fishing line.
Emily Blunt plays Harriet Chetwode-Talbot, and she has a client who is an avid fisherman, Sheik Muhammed from Yemen, who wants to introduce salmon fishing in his desert country.
So, Harriet contacts the salmon expert in the British Fisheries, Dr. Alfred Jones, played by Ewan McGregor, to ask for his help in fulfilling the dream of the sheik, who naturally has enough money to make it happen.
Dr. Jones turns down Harriet’s request, telling her that the project is fundamentally infeasible.
In the meantime, however, Patricia Maxwell, who is the press secretary for the Prime Minister and who is played by Kristin Scott Thomas, tells her people, “We need a good news story from the Middle East and a big one. We need it now.”
So, with pressure from the top of the government, Dr. Jones is practically blackmailed into working with Harriet to make Sheik Muhammed’s dream come true.
And with two attractive people working closely together, romantic sparks are bound to fly, right?
Not so fast, Dear Audience, because Dr. Jones is married, and Harriet has a serious boyfriend.
Dr. Jones changes his assessment of the project’s success from fundamentally infeasible to theoretically possible, the sheik is willing to pay 50 million pounds, and so the problem now is to make it all happen.
Did I mention that there are dissidents in Yemen who believe that the sheik’s dream of building a river in the desert and stocking it with fish is insulting to Allah?
Salmon Fishing in the Yemen makes the impossible possible in so many different ways, and not just in fishing.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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“Jeff, Who Lives at Home” Is Good, but Unoriginal
0March 25, 2012
“Good, but Unoriginal”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Jeff, Who Lives at Home may strike you as being familiar as you reach the end, which once again proves what I have been saying for years: Hollywood has run out of ideas.
If you have seen the 1998 Simon Birch, when you get to the climax in this movie, everything that leads up to it will suddenly become clear and you will quickly realize that you might have been watching a remake, only with the title character of this movie grown up from the title character of the previous movie.
However, the biggest clue comes at the beginning of the movie when Jeff says in a voice-over, “I can’t help but wonder about my fate.”
Jeff is played by Jason Segal, he is 30 years old, he lives in the basement of his mother’s house, and he believes that everything happens for a reason.
So, when he answers the phone and the caller is looking for someone named Kevin, that starts a series of events that guides Jeff through the rest of the movie, and they are mostly comic events.
Jeff’s mother, Sharon, played by Susan Sarandon, also calls Jeff from her workplace, and she sends Jeff on an errand that contributes to this day in the life of Jeff, who lives at home, also.
Then there is Pat, Jeff’s older brother who is played by Ed Helms. Pat is married, although there are problems in the marriage, and Pat doesn’t help their problems any when he surprises his wife by buying a new Porsche that they can’t afford.
The story takes place in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and thus it is possible that Jeff and Pat could run into each other while Jeff is out fulfilling his errand, it is possible that while Pat is showing off his new Porsche to Jeff that they happen to see Pat’s wife and believe that she is having an affair with the man she is meeting, and it is also possible that the subplot involving their mother with a co-worker could bring everyone and everything together for the climax at the end.
And, yes, it is possible that the filmmakers of this movie didn’t realize they were copying the plot of that previous movie, only with grownups instead of kids.
Jeff, Who Lives at Home is good, but not original.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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“Friends with Kids” Has Its Ups and Downs
0March 17, 2012
“Ups and Downs”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Friends with Kids is a comedy about three sets of couples who are all friends, but if you want to talk about it, you almost need a scorecard in order to keep everybody straight and to understand everything that goes on.
First of all, the movie was written and directed by Jennifer Westfeldt, who also stars as julie, the only woman in the three sets of friends who isn’t married.
Julie’s best friend is Jason, played by Adam Scott, who also stars in the “Parks and Recreation” TV series. Julie and Jason have been best friends forever, but they aren’t romantically involved with each other.
Second of all, Westfeldt’s real-life boyfriend, Jon Hamm, plays Ben, who is married to Missy, played by Kristen Wiig, who currently stars in “Saturday Night Live.”
And finally, the third couple are Leslie, played by Maya Rudolph, and Alex, played by Chris O’Dowd, who are also married and who are the first of the friends to have a baby.
When Ben and Missy also have a baby, there seems to be pandemonium whenever the friends get together, and the couples who have kids seem to be fighting more.
Meanwhile, Jason and Julie would also like to be parents, but because they are still looking for a romantic mate, they decide that they will have a baby together, but not get married, and Jason assures Julie, “I will be 100% committed to this half the time.”
Jason and Julie live in the same apartment building, and so it is easy ehough for them to share the parenting duties of their baby son, and they still discuss their respective dates with other people together, while they still search for “the one.”
Then they all go on a ski trip together, including Jason’s new girlfriend and Julie’s new boyfriend, and you can guess that something is going to happen that changes the lives of all the friends, but it is not what you expect.
You can also guess how the movie is going to end, but you might be wrong on that count, too, including a scene that contains the least romantic seduction you can imagine.
Friends with Kids goes on a little too long to get to where we expect it is going, and it has high points and low points and ups and downs.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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“Wanderlust” Has Happiest Ending Ever
0March 11, 2012
“Happiest Ending Ever”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Wanderlust stars Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston in what is not so much a romantic comedy as it is just a happy comedy, if there is such a classification.
In fact, the plot is as simple as “Boy has girl, boy almost loses girl, boy and girl stay together.”
However, what makes the movie interesting is where most of the story takes place, which is in a hippie commune that was started in 1971.
George and Linda are a young married couple in New York City whose professional lives take a sudden turn for the worse, and so they decide to pull up stakes and move to Atlanta, where George’s brother and his family live.
After a long drive, Linda insists that she has to get out of the car, and so they drive into a place with a sign that identifies it as “Elysium,” where they are greeted by a slightly overweight, naked man.
Startled, George tries to drive away, but he wrecks the car, and they are forced to stay there in what the residents call an “intentional community.”
When they introduce themselves to the group, George is asked, “If you’re George, where is John, Paul, and Ringo?”
The group claims that they have no leaders, that Mother Earth is the only leader they need, and there are no rules, just the way they all think about stuff.
In addition, there are no doors, even on the bathrooms, all the members share everything, and they believe in open sexual boundaries, which means that anything goes and with anyone.
At first, George likes living there more than Linda does, saying that he feels like he can breathe there for the first time, but then Linda starts to enjoy it more than George does, even though the most attractive woman in the group tells George that she believes that they should have sex together.
The scene in which George tries to prepare himself by boosting his confidence in front of a mirror is one of the funniest in the movie.
However, the plot turns weak when one of the oldest cliches in the world of movie plots occurs, that of developers wanting to take over the land and develop it into something else.
Wanderlust, though, has the happiest ending ever, and make sure you stay for the outtakes.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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“Young Adult” Is So Dark, It’s Black
0December 23, 2011
“So Dark, It’s Black”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Young Adult, because of the successes this year of Bad Teacher and Horrible Bosses, could have been called Bad Graduate or Horrible Alumna.
Instead, it is called Young Adult, because the protagonist, Mavis Gary, is the ghostwriter of a series of young-adult novels, but also because even though she is 37, she acts as if she were still in high school, where she was the popular prom queen.
The film was directed by Ivan Reitman and written by Diablo Cody, who previously worked together on the 2007 Juno, for which Cody won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, and Mavis in this film has even been referred to as a grown-up Juno.
Charlize Theron plays Mavis, and when the movie opens, she is living unhappily in Minneapolis, where she learns that the wife of her high-school sweetheart, Buddy Slade, has just recently had a baby.
So, Mavis says, “It’s like he’s a hostage,” and she drives back to her hometown of Mercury, Minnesota, where she intends to win Buddy back, rescue him, or whatever other euphemism she can think of for stealing Buddy away from his wife and newborn baby.
However, before Mavis can meet Buddy for an “innocent drink,” she encounters Matt Freehauf, whom she doesn’t remember from high school even though their lockers were right next to each other.
Matt was and still is a geek, he is crippled, and then Mavis remembers that he is the “hate-crime guy,” the boy from their high-school days who was brutally attacked and crippled by some jocks for being gay, even though Matt wasn’t gay.
Mavis tells Matt that she is back in town to get Buddy back, because they were meant to be together, and Matt tells Mavis what she already knows, that Buddy is married and his wife just had a baby.
Matt lives with his sister, has a distillery in his garage, and Mavis keeps calling on Matt for alcoholic friendship when her plans to steal Buddy away from his wife keep not working out, especially when Mavis makes a scene at the baby’s naming ceremony.
Mavis believes that most people in Mercury seem to be so happy with so little, and yet it is difficult for her to be happy.
Young Adult is a comedy, but it is so dark, it is black humor.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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Meet the World’s Weirdest People–And Then Some
0October 13, 2011
by Boulder Channel 1
in News
Here’s what gets me.
This obsession some of us have–well, a number of us have–okay, okay!–a lot of us have to get our names in the newspaper and to be the best at something–anything!–has really gotten out of hand.
For example, some people’s days aren’t made until they can try to convince a whole community to change its collective mind about some very important matter (to them) just by getting one teensy editorially mangled letter-to-the editor printed in the newspaper of their community of choice.
Then, if they are lucky, that one-letter writing campaign will start a response from the other side of the very important matter (to someone else), and a true dialogue develops. (Except, of course nobody is doing any actual talking and the newspaper’s editorial-page editor probably has a policy of no more than one letter per month published by the same letter writer.) Sometimes, these very important matters (to everybody) can range all the way from “Why isn’t the sidewalk in front of my house fixed?” to “I think we all should worship the Rammalammadingdong god Ram Lam.”
For another example, other people’s weeks, months and, yes, sometimes years aren’t made until they can get their names and records published in the official “book of weirdness,” the Guinness Book of World Records, which really became famous during the Baby Boomers’ best years: the Embarrassing Sixties.
Maybe you saw a story many years ago about a gathering of record holders at the Empire State Building. (This was ironic, because Fame, like all world records, is fleeting, and just as the Empire State Building used to be the world’s tallest building, the gathering included the sometime-in-the-future former ”most tattooed man,” “longest grape catcher,” “longest apple-peel peeler,” “most basketballs dribbler,” “most married couple” and–get this one–”most versatile human.”)
Now, you are probably thinking, “How can they prove that guy’s got the most tattoos, that guy caught a grape thrown from the greatest distance, that gal peeled the longest apple peel, that guy can dribble the most basketballs at once, that couple got married the most times and that guy–get this one–is the most versatile human? And just what does ‘versatile’ mean, anyway?”
Well, sorry to break their bubbles, but they can’t! Those people just got their first! If you want to get there second, you can be a weird (Sorry!) world record holder, too!
Walter Stiglitz, the Tattoo Man of North Plainfield, NJ, admitted that even after 5,552 tattoos, he still had room for another small one “here and there,” including his “privates,” which, unfortunately, he should never have referred to as “small,” regardless of its size.
Paul Tavilla, the Grapecatcher, caught a black Ribier (with seed) thrown 50 mph from 327 feet away for the ground record. That left open the record for other grapes thrown 51 mph from 328 feet and many more records at greater speeds from farther away with and without seeds.
Kathy Madison, the Apple Peeler from Wolcott, NY, peeled a 20-ounce cooking apple 2,068 inches in 11-1/2 hours on Oct. 16, 1976. That left the record book open for 21-ounce apples; 2,069 inches of peel and up; 11 hours, 29 minutes and down; and every day except October 16!
Bob Nickerson, the Dribbler from Gallitzin, PA, dribbled four basketballs in 13 maneuvers while telling bad jokes. What is open? Five basketballs, 14 maneuvers and up or–even better–good jokes!
Carol and Richard Roble, the Most Married Couple from Hempstead, NY, had been married in all 50 states and the District of Columbia–always on November 30. Mr. Roble said, “I don’t know if we got sex in every state, but close to it.” What is left for the record book? How many cities are there in the U.S.? How many countries in the world? And … well, you can take it from there.
And Ashrita Furman, the Most Versatile Human–. Oh, forget it. He probably has that title locked up, anyway.
Now, if you wanted to start your own category, have you thought about the World’s Most Prolific Letter-to-the-Editor Writer? Nah, who writes letters anymore?
Go for the most tattoos, especially including the small naughty bits.
I rest my case.
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“What’s Your Number?” One-Sidetrack Movie
0October 6, 2011
“One-Sidetrack Movie”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
What’s Your Number? follows the recent Hollywood trend of movies about women who are assertive, raunchy, bawdy, and, yes, even foul mouthed.
In other words, the target audience is young men, who Hollywood believes don’t want to see movies about women unless the women are assertive, raunchy, bawdy, and, yes, even foul mouthed.
Get the women to strip and show off their bodies, and, heck, Hollywood has expanded the audience to include teenage boys, too.
Anna Faris, she of the Scary Movie spoofs of the, well, scary movies and the surprisingly good 2008 The House Bunny, stars as Ally Darling, a young woman in Boston who creates a dilemma for herself.
Ally’s sister is getting married, and Ally starts feeling sorry for herself. Then she learns that the average number of lovers a woman has in her lifetime is 10.5.
Ally counts up all her past lovers and determines that she has had 19, but then when she also learns that if a woman hasn’t gotten married after having had 20 lovers, the odds are she will never get married, Ally decides that she will never sleep with a man again unless he is the one she is going to marry.
Well, when that plan doesn’t work, Ally decides to track down all her past lovers to make sure that she hadn’t overlooked one and that he just might have been the one for her.
Of course, that is going to be difficult, and so Ally enlists the help of Colin, the guy who lives across the hallway from her in her apartment building.
Colin is played by Chris Evans, and he agrees to help Ally in exchange for being allowed to hide out in Ally’s apartment every morning so that he can avoid the latest woman whom he brought home the night before.
So, you can see where this is going, can’t you, and if you have seen the trailer for the movie, you have already seen most of the movie.
Now, there is one sidetrack that you won’t anticipate, and for a while you might believe that you were fooled.
We also see Ally’s parents, played by Blythe Danner and Ed Begley Jr., who are divorced because they have two entirely different personalities.
What’s Your Number? is a one-sidetrack movie that you can surely avoid.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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“Straw Dogs” an Exercise in Violence
0September 24, 2011
“Another Unnecessary Remake”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Straw Dogs is a remake of the classic 1971 film starring Dustin Hoffman and Susan George that was directed by acclaimed director Sam Peckinpah, who was known for the violence in his movies.
This 2011 version stars James Marsden and Kate Bosworth and was directed by Rod Lurie, and the location has been changed from a small town in western England to a small town in Southern Mississippi.
The title comes from the straw dogs that were used as ceremonial objects in ancient China. They were used as sacrifices, dressed up, put on the altar, and then when the ceremony was over, they were thrown into the street.
David and Amy are married, and when they drive into Blackwater, Mississippi, where Amy grew up, she mentions that the young good ol’ boys in town don’t have much to do anymore after their glory days of high-school football are over, and David compares them to the “straw dogs” of ancient China.
David is a Hollywood screenwriter, Amy recently starred in a television series, and they are in Blackwater because Amy’s father died and they are there to fix up his house and then sell it.
So, when they meet Charlie in town and find out that he has a small construction business, they hire Charlie to repair the roof on the barn.
Charlie says, “We take care of our own here,” and then he says to Amy, “Remember when I took care of you?”
And that is when David learns that Amy and Charlie had been high-school sweethearts.
Well, you can see where this is going, can’t you? Charlie and his construction team are rude and obnoxious, they ogle Amy because of the provocative way she dresses, and they belittle David almost every chance they get, because he doesn’t understand their small-town Southern culture, doesn’t fit in, and unknowingly insults them.
And then when Charlie and the boys invite David to go hunting with them, David feels obligated to go with them as a gesture of good will, but, of course, things don’t end well.
Things don’t end well at all, which can also be said about the whole movie.
There are some small subplots that attempt to flesh out the main plot, but basically the movie is an exercise in violence.
Straw Dogs is just another unnecessary remake.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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“The Debt” Truth Is a Luxury
0September 9, 2011
“Truth Is a Luxury”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
The Debt is a suspense thriller that shifts between different years, different locations, and even different actors playing the same characters, and the suspense and shocking conclusions to various scenes keep the audience’s attention from start to finish.
The story is about a secret mission conducted in the 1960s by three Israeli secret agents and the consequences of that mission which follow them for the rest of their lives.
The three secret agents are Stephan, David, and Rachel, and their mission is to slip into East Berlin, find and identify a suspected Nazi war criminal, capture him, sneak him out of East Berlin, and then take him back to Israel where he will stand trial for the atrocities he committed in a German concentration camp located in Poland.
Rachel is played by Jessica Chastain back in the Sixties during the mission, and when David mentions to her that she is brave, she says, “I’m not brave. I’m terrified.”
Helen Mirren plays Rachel in the present-day scenes, she still has the facial scar that she received during a bloody fight with their prisoner, and once again she is terrific in this role.
Present-day Rachel has a grown-up daughter who is married and has a son. The daughter has also written a book about the mission that has become a success, and Rachel sometimes reads from the book when her daughter is asked to give talks about the book.
However, there is a secret about the mission, which didn’t exactly go as planned, and as Rachel tells Stephan, Rachel cannot tell her daughter the truth, because it would destroy her daughter.
Eventually we see the details of the mission back in the Sixties, and we also learn the truth. The Nazi war criminal that they are after is working under a different name as a doctor, and Rachel and David pretend to be married and having difficulty conceiving a child.
So, Rachel goes to the doctor for help and has to experience the humiliation, embarrassment, and horror of being examined by him while the agents put their plan into action and finally abduct him.
What happens next is the consequences they have to face in the present.
The Debt shows that the truth is a luxury, it plays with the audience, and the shocks keep coming until the very end.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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“The Change-Up” Gross, Coarse, and Crass
0August 27, 2011
“Gross, Coarse, and Crass”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
The Change-Up begs the question, “Are you getting as tired of watching these lame body-switch movies as I am of reviewing them?”
Another question that goes begging about this movie is “Did the filmmakers believe they could get bigger audiences to come to this Hollywood cliche of a story by throwing in lots of obscenities and excessive nudity?”
And, finally, “How does Jason Bateman feel about being in one of the funniest movies of the year and one of the worst movies of the year in a matter of only one month?”
Yes, Bateman plays Dave Lockwood, a happily married father of three who is a successful lawyer and close to being made a partner in his firm.
Meanwhile, Dave’s best friend is Mitch Planko, played by Ryan Reynolds, who is a single actor and womanizer, but because the story takes place in Atlanta, you can’t imagine that he is all that successful an actor, can you?
Dave and Mitch have been best buddies since the third grade, and one night they go drinking together, and at the end of the evening they are talking about how they envy each other’s life while they are both urinating in a fountain in a park, and they both say simultaneously, “I wish I had your life.”
There is a statue of a woman overlooking the fountain, the lights go out around the city, the statue’s expression changes to one of a smile, and, of course, you know what happens.
Yes, when they wake up the next morning in their respective beds, even though they look the same to the audience, Dave is now in Mitch’s body and Mitch is now in Dave’s. And then comedy is supposed to ensue, but it doesn’t.
They get together, rush back to the fountain where they hope to undo the switch, but the fountain is gone, having been removed and is going to be restored and placed in a different location.
If they fill out the proper paperwork, the city might be able to tell them in three days to three weeks where the fountain is going to be.
The boys tell Dave’s wife, Jamie, about the switch. She is played by Leslie Mann, and of course she doesn’t believe them.
The Change-Up is gross, coarse, and crass, and I recommend you avoid it.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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“Crazy, Stupid, Love.” Stupid, Pointless, Waste
0August 26, 2011
“Stupid, Pointless, Waste.”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Crazy, Stupid, Love. has too many characters and too many love stories to be classified as having a plot about a “love triangle.”
No, call this one as being about a “love octagon,” and not all of the love stories are pleasant and tasteful.
Here are the characters: Steve Carell and Julianne Moore are Cal and Emily Weaver. They have been married 25 years, have three children, and Emily wants a divorce, because she hs been having an affair with David, a man she works with, who is played by Kevin Bacon.
Ryan Gosling is Jacob, a studly do-wrong who picks up any woman he wants in a bar every night of the week and takes her home for a one-night stand.
Emma Stone is Hannah, a young lawyer who is rejected by the man she is interested in and then sets her sights on Jacob, but she refuses to play his game and forces him to play her game.
Jonah Bobo is Robbie Weaver, the 13-year-old son of Cal and Emily, and he has a major crush on his babysitter, Jessica, played by Analeigh Tipton, but she is 17 years old, and she has a crush on an older man, who is also married.
And, finally, Marisa Tomei is Kate, Robbie’s eighth-grade English teacher who is also out in the dating scene and figures into the stories, too.
So, when Cal moves out of the house and gets his own apartment, he starts going to a bar to pick up women, but his pick-up line leaves something to be desired. He says to one woman, “My wife is having intercourse with someone who is not me.”
Jacob sees Cal, takes pity on him, and decides to mentor Cal in the ways of picking up women in a bar, as well as helping Cal to make other changes in his life-style.
However, Cal still has feelings for Emily and goes over to the house in the middle of the night to take care of the yard and garden without Emily’s knowing that he is doing so.
Meanwhile, Robbie keeps pestering Jessica about his love for her, and she keeps rejecting him, not only because of his youth, but also because of her desire for that older man.
Crazy, Stupid, Love. is just a stupid, pointless, waste.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots”
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“The Hangover Part II” Same Movie Twice
0June 2, 2011
“Same Movie Twice”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
The Hangover Part II is, sure enough, the sequel to the most successful R-rated comedy of all time, and you will have to admit that this one is even raunchier than the first one.
Not funnier, just raunchier.
As a matter of fact, this is just the same movie as the first one with even the same characters, except that there is a different groom and it takes place in Bangkok, Thailand, instead of in Las Vegas.
It even has a new catch phrase to replace “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.” The new catch phrase is “Bangkok has him now, and it will never let him go.”
Once again we have Bradley Cooper as Phil, Ed Helms as Stu, Zach Galifianakis as Alan, and Ken Jeong as Mr. Chow, and the plot is exactly the same, except for the change of locale.
Even Doug, the groom who was missing for most of the story in the first movie returns, and he is even missing for most of the story in this one, too, except that everyone knows where he is. The person whose whereabouts aren’t known is Teddy, the 16-year-old brother of the bride.
So, here is the story. Stu, the mild-mannered dentist who has a dark side with a demon in him, is getting married to Lauren, a beautiful woman from Thailand, and the wedding ceremony is to take place on her parents’ estate in Thailand.
When the movie opens, Phil is talking on a phone, and he says, “It happened again,” adding that the situation is a little worse than “no-wedding bad.”
Then we see a title of “One Week Earlier,” and here we go again.
Stu doesn’t even want a bachelor party and is happy to settle for a bachelor brunch at a local IHOP restaurant, and he is even forced to invite Alan to the wedding, who was the cause of all the trouble the first time.
Once in Thailand, everything goes from bad to worse, especially after the guys go have a campfire on the beach and what was planned to be only one beer and roast some marshmallows.
And they wake up the next morning in a trashed hotel room in Bangkok with no idea where Teddy is.
The Hangover Part II should have been called “The Hangover, Take II.”
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
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“Bridesmaids” All Very Funny
0May 19, 2011
Bridesmaids is one of the funniest movies you will ever see if you are a gal and also one of the funniest movies you will ever see if you are a guy, because contrary to what you might think at first glance, it is definitely not a “chick flick.”
In other words, it is not rated “R” for “Romance.”
No, if anything, it is rated “R” for raunchy, ribaldry, repartee, regale, revelry, romping, roughhousing, rattlebrain, roguery, rascality, ridiculing, razzing, raillery, ragging, and ribbing, not to mention rude.Kristen Wiig stars as
Annie, and May a Rudolph plays Lillian, Annie’s best friend, who is getting married.
So, Lillian asks Annie to be her maid of honor and to handle all the duties that a maid of honor takes care of, which Annie enthusiastically agrees to do.
Unfortunately, Annie doesn’t have any experience with being a maid of honor, and she has to look up what the duties are on the Internet.
In fact, Annie’s own boyfriend recently left her, and although she works selling rings in a store, her sales technique leaves a lot to be desired. She tells one couple who want to buy wedding rings, “You cannot trust anybody, ever.”
Then Annie meets Helen, one of the other bridesmaids, whose husband is very wealthy and who is very competitive. At the engagement party, Annie and Helen get into a “dueling speeches” contest trying to outdo each other, which escalates into a “dueling songs” contest.
Lillian asks Annie to hang out with Helen just once, hoping that they will become friends, and so they arrange to meet for tennis at Helen’s country club, but before they start playing, they can’t resist getting into a “dueling philosophies” contest, and the tennis itself quickly becomes a “dueling tennis” contest.
One of the other bridesmaids is Megan, and to say that she is unique would be stating the obvious. She is overweight, but completely unselfconscious about it, she is not afraid to say anything or to do anything in public, and she does.
Meanwhile, there is a policeman that Annie keeps having encounters with, some public and some private, and there is an especially funny scene when Annie tries to get arrested because she wants the policeman to help her.
Bridesmaids is all this and very much more, and all very funny.
