Posts tagged review
“Win Win” Winner Winner
May 4th
“Winner Winner”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Win Win is the third film written and directed by Tom McCarthy, after the 2003 The Station Agent and the 2007 The Visitor, and if you saw those two films, you have a good idea of how excellent this one is, also.
You might not have seen those films, because low-budget, independent films don’t have extended runs in theaters, no matter how excellent they are.
So, see this one as soon as you can.
Paul Giamatti stars as Mike Flaherty. He is a husband and father of two girls, but the twist is that he is a struggling lawyer in New Jersey and the coach of a high-school wrestling team that, for lack of a better word, is awful.
Mike is struggling with problems in all aspects of his life, starting at home with a dead tree in the front yard. His wife, Jackie, makes him promise to call someone about it, because she says, “I don’t want it coming down on the house.”
But when Mike gets to his office in an old residential house, he has other problems to worry about. He is going to need $6,000 to replace the boiler in the basement even though it was repaired three months ago.
Also, one of his clients, Leo Poplar, is in the early stages of dementia, and a judge wants to appoint a guardian for him. So, Mike volunteers to be Leo’s guardian, even though Leo wants to live in his own house, and he hasn’t seen his daughter in over 20 years.
However, Mike tells Leo that the court has ordered Leo to live in a retirement home, puts him in one, and then pockets the money that Leo gets every month.
Complicated, right? And maybe even illegal.
But wait. There is more. Leo’s 16-year-old grandson, Kyle, suddenly shows up, having run away from home in Ohio and wanting to live with Leo, because his mother is in a drug-treatment program and they don’t get along at all.
So, Jackie takes pity on Kyle and invites him to stay with them.
But, wait, there is still more. Kyle is an excellent wrestler, which solves one of Mike’s problems, but then Kyle’s mother shows up, which causes even more problems.
Win Win brings to mind “Winner Winner, chicken dinner,” as the kids like to say.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
“Hall Pass” Mixed Messages
Mar 21st
“Mixed Messages”
HALL PASS is the latest attempt at humor from the Farrelly brothers, Peter and Bobby, who previously were responsible for the 1994 DUMB & DUMBER, the 1998 THERE’S SOMETHING ABOUT MARY, the 2000 ME, MYSELF & IRENE, and the 2001 SHALLOW HAL, to name a few . . . too many.
So, to send you a mixed message, don’t waste any time seeing this movie.
However, if you are forced to see it now or accidentally see it later, be prepared for a load of crap, to be crude, and literal, and not funny.
Also be prepared for the movie to take way too long to get started, just as this review is taking.
It stars Owen Wilson as Rick and Jason Sudeikis as his best friend, Fred. Respectively, they are married to Jenna Fischer as Maggie and Christina Applegate as Grace.
Like all men, Rick and Fred take long looks at beautiful women whenever they can, and like all wives, Maggie and Grace take personal offense when their husbands do.
So, on the advice of a friend, Maggie decides to give Rick a chance to get his wanderlust out of his system. She says to him, “I’m giving you a hall pass. One week off from marriage.”
Grace does the same with Fred, and together Maggie and Grace take the kids and travel to Cape Cod to spend a week with Maggie’s father, leaving Rick and Fred in Providence, Rhode Island, to do whatever they want for a week with no wives around.
Then we get a day-by-day account of the expected horndog hilarity, which we know is going to end with a message, right? The movie also cuts back and forth from Providence to Cape Cod as we watch the wives encounter some unexpected situations, as well.
On Day 6 Richard Jenkins shows up in Providence as Coakley, a mentor and hero for Rick and Fred, and he shows them what he does that makes him succeed with women, especially by throwing a big party at his house with a lot of women and a lot of opportunities for Rick and Fred.
Well, I won’t spoil the movie for you by telling you what you can already guess, but I do suggest that you stay until after the credits.
HALL PASS contains mixed messages, some funny and others not at all.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
“127 Hours” Don’t Try This on Your Own
Feb 2nd
“Don’t Try This on Your Own”
127 HOURS received a number of Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Film Editing, Best Original Score, Best Original Song, and Best Actor for its star, James Franco.
Franco, of course, plays Aron Ralston, the hiker who in 2003 was hiking by himself in a remote area in Utah when his right arm got pinned underneath a boulder, which he wrote about in his book, BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE.
The most interesting part of the story, of course, is that after failing for days to be able to dislodge the boulder, Ralston amputated his arm with a small knife in order to save himself from dying.
So, if you already know the whole story, you might think, why bother seeing this movie?
Well, because of all those Academy Award nominations, of course, and the way that the story is told on screen by director Danny Boyle.
The story begins on a Saturday with Ralston arriving in the area where he is going to start hiking.
He encounters two young women who are lost, and he tells them how to find the place they are looking for, but they look at him with suspicion.
Realizing why, Ralston removes the bandanna from his face and says, “I’m only a psychopath on weekdays. Today is Saturday.”
While the three of them spend some time together, Ralston tells them that he is an engineer, but hiking in areas like this is what he really wants to do, and he considers this his second home.
The girls invite Ralston to a party the next night at the place where they are staying, they say goodbye, and then the interesting part of the story begins.
Ralston falls in a crevice, and a large boulder dislodges and traps his arm against the rock wall.
The girls are out of shouting distance at this point, and now, you might ask, how can the story be interesting for the rest of the movie?
It might not be if the rest consisted of just grimacing, struggling, frustration, more struggling, more grimacing, even more struggling, and even more grimacing, but don’t forget all those Academy Award nominations and the talents of the writers, director, and actor.
127 HOURS is worth all the awards it receives, but don’t try this on your own.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”