“Barney’s Version” One Man’s Marriages
Mar 17th
“One Man’s Marriages”
BARNEY’S VERSION tells the story of Barney Panofsky and covers 36 years in the life of this hard-drinking, cigar-smoking, hockey-loving Canadian TV producer and especially of his three marriages.
Barney is played by Paul Giamatti, and we can assume from the film’s title that what we see are Barney’s version of everything, in particular one event that resulted in the death of his best friend, who played a major part in the ending of Barney’s second marriage, which got off to a very bad start on the day of the wedding.
The film begins in the present, and we see Barney make a phone call at 3:30 a.m. supposedly to talk to Miriam, who was his third wife.
However, when a man answers the phone, he tells Barney that he isn’t going to wake up Miriam in the middle of the night just to talk to Barney.
So, Barney says, “Just ask her what she wants me to do with all these nude photos I have of her.”
Now, we never see those photos, and given what we will eventually learn about Barney, they might not even exist, but either that statement or possibly just the late-night phone call itself might have caused something serious to have happened to the man who answered the telephone.
Then we learn that a retired police detective has just published a book that claims that Barney got away with murder over an incident that happened in Barney’s past.
The movie then has its first of many flashbacks, and we are back in 1974 in Rome, Italy, where we see Barney living it up with all his friends.
Barney is the only one with a real job, and when the woman he is dating gets pregnant, Barney decides to do the decent thing and marry her.
However, Clara reveals information about herself that all comes up as a surprise to Barney, and when the baby is born, Barney learns that he isn’t even the father.
Then we switch to 1975 and Montreal, where Barney is working for his uncle, who introduces Barney to a nice Jewish girl from a wealthy family, who becomes Barney’s second wife.
We also meet Barney’s father, played by Dustin Hoffman, who is a retired policeman.
BARNEY’S VERSION is 36 years of one man’s very interesting marriages.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
“The Adjustment Bureau” Gimmicky Love Story
Mar 10th
“Gimmicky Love Story”
THE ADJUSTMENT BUREAU stars Matt Damon and Emily Blunt in a love story set in a modern world of fantasy which argues that the fate of the world is predetermined by a group of men all wearing dark suits and hats.
However, when you learn that the film is based on a short story by Philip K. Dick, that premise doesn’t seem so unreasonable.
And then when an important person in the plan doesn’t want to follow his predetermined destiny, what happens to the plan and the people pulling his strings?
When we first meet those men in suits and hats, Richardson, the team leader played by John Slattery, says to the team, “Everybody needs a vacation. Even us.”
The immediate object of their adjustment work is David Norris, a charismatic young man running for senator of New York. However, when something embarrassing from his past is revealed, he loses the election.
Then when he believes that he is alone in the men’s room and is rehearsing his concession speech, a beautiful young woman named Elise comes out of one of the stalls, where she had been hiding from security for having crashed a wedding in the hotel.
They talk. They bond. They kiss.
And then they part, and all David has is her first name.
Then years later, they accidentally meet on a bus when David is going to work for a big corporation. This time Elise writes her phone number on a card for him, but again forces intervene, and they have to part suddenly.
However, when David gets to the offices where he works, he sees something that he wasn’t supposed to see, and the Adjustment team has to intervene. They take him aside, explain what is going on, and Richardson takes the card with Elise’s number on it.
You see, the fate of the world has already been planned, and it will be screwed up if David and Elise get together. Therefore, the Adjustment team has to keep them apart by interfering with any circumstances that would allow them to get together, because they would fall in love and ruin the Adjustment team’s plans.
But now David doesn’t want to play by the rules and live according to plan anymore.
THE ADJUSTMENT BUREAU has an interesting concept, but is basically a gimmicky love story.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
Rango – Movie Trailer
Mar 4th
Rango is a sheltered chameleon living as an ordinary family pet, while facing a major identity crisis. After all, how high can you aim when your whole purpose in life is to blend in? When Rango accidentally winds up in the gritty, gun-slinging town of Dirt – a lawless outpost populated by the desert’s most wily and whimsical creatures – the less-than-courageous lizard suddenly finds he stands out. Welcomed as the last hope the town has been waiting for, new Sheriff Rango is forced to play his new role to the hilt…
