Posts tagged married
“Silver Linings Playbook” Contrived and Over the Top
Feb 6th
“Contrived and Over the Top”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Silver Linings Playbook has already won some awards and will likely win more, but some of you might be disappointed in this so-called “dramedy” about two troubled souls.
Bradley Cooper stars as Pat, he is in a psychiatric facility in Baltimore, where he has been ordered to stay by a judge after Pat went home, found his wife Nikki in the shower with another man, and went berserk, which is now referred to as “the incident.”
While there, Pat has been diagnosed as being bipolar with mood swings, but we see him on the phone talking to someone, and he says, “I’m better now, and I hope you are, too.”
After being in the facility eight months, Pat’s mother takes him out and drives him back home to Philadelphia, where Pat will now live with her and his father, played by Robert De Niro.
You see, Nikki has left Pat, sold their home, and now has a restraining order against him, but Pat plans to get in shape, get his old job back as a substitute history teacher, and get Nikki back, too.
Pat’s mother tells him that she didn’t tell his father that she was bringing Pat home and to take things easy, because his father lost his job and is now a small-time bookie, who is also a fanatic obsessed with the Philadelphia Eagles professional football team.
In fact, Pat’s father is such a fanatic that he had his own “incident” in the past and is now banned from ever attending another Eagles home game.
Meanwhile, Pat is invited to Sunday dinner by his friend Ron, who is married to Nikki’s friend, Veronica, they just had a baby, and Ron is feeling crushed.
Veronica’s sister, Tiffany, played by Jennifer Lawrence, is also at the dinner, and she has problems of her own, having recently lost both her husband and her job. Her husband was a policeman who was killed on duty, and she lost her job for reasons I won’t go into here.
Well, you can guess that Pat and Tiffany will have a troubled relationship, that they will have many obstacles to overcome, but not that the climax is a big dance contest, which substitutes for the Big Game at the end of many movies.
Silver Linings Playbook is too contrived and over the top.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
“Anna Karenina” Is Cinematic Opera
Dec 13th
“Cinematic Opera”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Anna Karenina is based on Count Leo Tolstoy’s second great major novel, it is about a tragic love story, and of all the versions that have been filmed about it, this one is the most recent.
This one might also be the most daring of them all, considering how it portrays the action, and it undoubtedly will not be to everyone’s liking.
It stars Keira Knightly as Anna, Jude Law as her stodgy husband, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson as the dashing Count Vronsky.
The story begins in 1874 Imperial Russia, and you might wonder what the heck is going on with the action consisting of actors and actresses being on a stage in a theater?
Talk about suspension of disbelief! We have to pretend that we are watching a stage performance of this familiar story, and then we have to pretend that we didn’t see the actors walk through the back of the theater building and continue acting in a realistic setting like we are accustomed to seeing in most traditional films.
And then before we know it, the realistic scenes switch back and forth without warning with the surrealistic scenes inside a theater, including an unbelievable scene inside the theater about a horse race with real horses and riders dashing across the stage.
If that technique doesn’t throw off the audience enough, even if you are familiar with the story, you might be thrown off by the confusing Russian names, which make it difficult to keep all the characters straight, as well as by a subplot of another love story between two of the minor characters.
The main love story is about Anna, an aristocratic married woman with a child who falls in love with Count Vronsky and eventually has a child with him.
I won’t spoil the ending for those of you who are not familiar with the story, but for those of you who are, you might be disappointed in that a subplot coda is tacked on after the traditional ending, which in my mind ruined the story.
In addition, this film reminded me of opera, which is a stylistic rendition of a story consisting of vocal performances with orchestral accompaniment.
Anna Karenina is cinematic opera without the singing, but with music throughout, it ruins a perfectly good, classic love story, and I don’t like opera.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
Smashed – Movie Trailer
Dec 13th
Kate (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) and Charlie (Aaron Paul) are a young married couple whose bond is built on a mutual love of music, laughter and drinking…especially the drinking. When Kateʼs drinking leads her to dangerous places and her job as a school teacher is put into jeopardy, she decides to join AA and get sober. With the help of her friend and sponsor Jenny, and the vice principal at her school, the awkward, but well intentioned, Mr. Davies, Kate takes steps toward improving her health and life. Sobriety isnʼt as easy as Kate had anticipated. Her new lifestyle brings to the surface a troubling relationship with her mother, facing the lies sheʼs told her employer and calls into question whether or not her relationship with Charlie is built on love or is just boozy diversion from adulthood.