Posts tagged live
“City Island” We’ve All Got a Secret
May 6th
We’ve All Got a Secret
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
CITY ISLAND is a terrifically enjoyable little film that has the audience chuckling all the way through it and sometimes causes outright laughter.
The title refers to a little island off the east side of The Bronx in New York that is only one square mile in size and that used to be an old fishing village. We are told that if you live there, you would never think about moving somewhere else.
Vince Rizzo and his family live on the island, they are one of the most interesting and unintentionally funny families you will ever meet, and they all have a secret that they are keeping from each other, some small and others very big indeed.
Vince is played by Andy Garcia, his wife, Joyce, is played by Julianna Margulies, and they have an older daughter named Vivian who isn’t currently living at home and a teenage son named Vince Jr. who is in high school. All of the actors are outstanding with their parts and characterizations.
The time is spring break, and Vivian is home from college, or so her family believes, but Vivian’s secret is much more than just she has dropped out of college and doesn’t really want to be home.
Vince is a correctional officer who makes a point of telling people that he is not a “prison guard,” and once a week he tells his family that he has a poker game with friends, but that isn’t where he goes, although he is not having an affair, which is what Joyce thinks he is really up to.
Joyce’s secret at first is just that she smokes in secret, and when she learns that smoking isn’t allowed in prison, she says, “Being in prison and not being allowed to smoke? That’s like being in jail!”
Junior’s secret is that he has a fetish for overweight girls and for one of their neighbors in particular.
Then when Vince brings a prisoner home to stay with them for a while, the prisoner becomes Vince’s biggest secret of all his secrets, and their first dinner together with everyone is priceless.
However, the final showdown when all their secrets are revealed is classic and priceless.
CITY ISLAND is a terrific film about a family who could have their own television show called “We’ve All Got a Secret.”
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
The Joneses – Movie Trailer
Apr 27th
A picture-perfect family moves into an upscale community, impressing the locals and integrating themselves into every aspect of the community until a sudden tragedy forces them to reassess their priorities. Steve (David Duchovny) and Kate Jones (Demi Moore) have everything a happily married couple could ever want: their kids, Jenn (Amber Heard) and Mick (Ben Hollingsworth), are intelligent and attractive, they live in an affluent neighborhood, and their sprawling suburban home is jam-packed with all of the coolest gizmos and gadgets that money can buy. It isn’t long before the Joneses have struck up a friendship with their next-door neighbors Larry (Gary Cole) and Summer (Glenne Headly), and become integral components of their community. But take a closer look at the situation and you’ll start to see something ominous lurking just beneath the surface. It’s only when the Joneses are confronted with an unexpected disaster that they finally discover who they really are beneath the glossy veneer of consumerism.
“Date Night” Date Night from Hell
Apr 14th
Date Night from Hell
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
DATE NIGHT is the perfect movie for married couples who have such rituals, but it should come with the following warning: “We’re professionals. Don’t try this when you leave home on your date night.”
Steve Carell and Tina Fey play Phil and Claire Foster, who live in New Jersey and who have the obligatory two young children. Phil is a tax accountant, Claire is a real-estate agent, and at the beginning of the movie we see what they do on a typical date night and their typical bedtime routine for discussing whether or not to have sex, both of which should be familiar and funny to couples in the audience.
Then when they learn that two friends of theirs who are married to each other are going to break up, Phil and Claire decide to change their usual date night of dinner at a local restaurant and instead go to a fancy restaurant in New York City, even though they don’t have reservations, which normally have to be made a month in advance.
So, while they are waiting in the bar for a table to open up, Phil hears the hostess calling “Tripplehorn, party of two” more than once, decides that the Tripplehorns are a no-show, says to Claire, “I want this night to be different,” and announces to the hostess, “We are the Tripplehorns.”
Once they are seated, they toast “Here’s to a great night” with empty wine glasses, and then all hell breaks loose.
Two men show up at their table and want to talk to Phil and Claire outside in private. The Fosters assume that they have been “busted” for taking the Tripplehorns’ reservation, but, no, the two men believe that they ARE the Tripplehorns and demand that they turn over a flash drive to them, a small, portable drive for a computer.
And thus begins a “great night” of laughs for the audience and certainly a “different” night for Phil and Claire.
There is at least a double case of mistaken identity, blackmail involving a mob boss, a crooked politician, crooked policemen, a building break-in, a slow chase across the lake in Central Park, and one of the funniest car chases you will ever see.
DATE NIGHT is a date night from hell for the Fosters, but a great night for the audience.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
