Posts tagged help
“The Goods: Live Hard Sell Hard” Rude, Crude, Extremely Lewd and Very, Very Funny
Aug 19th
Rude, Crude, Extremely Lewd and Very, Very Funny
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
THE GOODS: LIVE HARD, SELL HARD is one of those movies that get talked about more than seen, which is a shame, because it is well worth your time, trouble, and money.
It just won’t win any awards for quality or be on anyone’s list of the best films of 2009 or any year.
Of course, this means that it will do bang-up business when it comes out on DVD.
Jeremy Pivens stars as Don “The Goods” Ready, and so the title can refer to him just as easily as it can to the concept of the movie, which is selling used cars.
In fact, the first sale in the movie is a classic, and it takes place before the opening titles.
But as Ready says at the end of an inspiring speech on an airplane to convince the stewardess to let him smoke, “I’m Don Ready, and I’ve got the goods!”
Then you have to see what happens next to believe it.
Don and his team of two men and one woman are freelance used-car sellers, and they are called to Temecula, California, to help save the dealership of Ben Selleck, played by James Brolin.
They will be in charge over the Fourth of July weekend to save the business that has been in the family for 40 years, and one method they use is to hire some dancers from a local strip club to loosen up the customers.
One subplot is that Selleck’s daughter, Ivy, is engaged to the son of Selleck’s rival, played by Alan Thicke, who wants to buy Selleck’s dealership and give it to his son as a place where his son’s band can rehearse.
Another subplot is that one of Selleck’s salesmen might be Don’s son from a one-night stand he had in Temecula 23 years ago.
And a third subplot is a running reference to something bad that happened to Don in Albuquerque, which we don’t learn about until near the end of the movie.
So, Don makes a deal with Selleck’s rival that they will sell every car on the lot by the end of the weekend, and if they don’t–. Well, you have to see the movie to know what the bargain is.
THE GOODS: LIVE HARD, SELL HARD is rude, crude, extremely lewd, and very, very funny.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard – Movie Trailer
Aug 14th
A smooth-talking jack-of-all-trades attempts to save a struggling car dealership from certain bankruptcy in this comedy starring Jeremy Piven, directed by Chappelle’s Show creator Neal Brennan, and produced by Will Ferrell and Adam McKay’s Gary Sanchez Productions. Don Ready (Piven) takes sales seriously; he’s always up for a challenge, and he parties as hard as he works. Approached to help an ailing car dealership from falling into the red, Ready recruits a crew of his best men and descends upon the quiet town of Temecula determined to succeed. Before long the dealership is flourishing and Ready’s crew are kings of the roost, but what happens when the man who made his mint by hustling cars meets the one woman who isn’t charmed by his formidable skills as a salesman. Realizing this may be his one shot at true love, Ready starts working overtime to convince the woman of his dreams that he’s the best bargain on the lot. Has the hustler finally found his soul, or is he so locked into his anything-goes lifestyle that there’s no looking back? Ving Rhames, Ed Helms, James Brolin, and David Koechner co-star.
“(500) Days of Summer” Movie of Expectation
Aug 5th
Movie of Expectation
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
(500) DAYS OF SUMMER of Summer is an anti-romantic comedy, but more than that, it is a long string of gimmicks from its title to its final scene, when a new character is introduced.
The gimmick in the title is the parentheses around “500” and the fact that “Summer” is the name of the character played winningly by Zooey Deschanel.
The gimmick of the movie is that it portrays the first 500 days in the relationship of Summer and Tom, played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who meet when she joins the greeting-card company that Tom works for as a writer.
Thankfully we don’t see every one of those days, but the gimmick of the story is that it jumps randomly throughout the 500 days, identifying each scene with a number that marks the day.
The gimmick of the plot is what we are told by a narrator at the beginning when he says, “You should know up front that this is not a love story.”
No, it is a love-story wannabe on Tom’s part and a romantic-comedy wannabe on the filmmakers’ part.
So, even though Summer tells Tom at the beginning of their relationship that she doesn’t believe in love, but is willing to be best friends with Tom, like all men of the romantic persuasion, he either doesn’t believe her or else he believes that he can get her to change her mind.
Especially since they are “friends with benefits,” as the kids today are calling it.
Well, the film begins essentially on Day 290 when Tom is reacting to Summer’s having broken up with him, and Tom’s adolescent sister, Rachel, is called over to help him get through it.
Yes, there is the “wise younger sister” gimmick in the movie, too.
And, yes, we go back to Day 1 when they meet, and eventually we will get to Day 500 at the end of the film, but the days in between move around so quickly and so much out of order that the audience can suffer from romantic whiplash just trying to follow the action and to keep up with Tom’s expectations about their relationship that keep flying in the face of everything that Summer keeps telling him.
Now, the actors are appealing, but the movie, not so much.
(500) DAYS OF SUMMER is a movie of romantic expectation.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”