Trainwreck

Judd Apatow, 2015

IMDB

3/5

Apatow's last two full feature films, This is 40 and Funny People, did not live up to how good Knocked Up was. This is probably because Apatow wasn't really a present force in Knocked Up, already living the life of a married guy with kids. There was a certain organized simplicity that Knocked Up had going for it. The latter two films felt like there was a lot of forced messages within them. As if Apatow had a lot to say and had to inject it into the meat of those two films. Not that he is not an interesting guy, he undoubtedly is. But maybe his married guy angst is better served on the stage in front of a crowd, and not in front of a screen. Maybe they should be two separate things. Okay, now back to his movie. Judd Apatow set out to prove two things with his latest comedic installment. One - that he is able to finally top his best work in Knocked Up. Two - that Judd has a lot of friends in Hollywood. Particularly a lot of comedian friends. Trainwreck, written by the super talented and super funny Amy Schumer, loads up on comedian cameos (Dave Attell, Jim Florentine, Bobby Kelly, Mike Birbiglia). But it doesn't stop with comedians. Unexpected roles by John Cena and Lebron James add some of biggest laugh out loud moments. The casting process must have been a lot of fun. The editing process was probably also a lot of fun. Shit, the whole movie was probably a blast to make.

Schumer is kind of the perfect woman to put in the role of the very sexually active fun-seeker who likes a few pops and isn't ready to settle down and get serious in life. Bill Hader is kind of the perfect guy to compliment that fun-seeker as the square sports medicine guy who hasn't had much luck in the dating world. Credit is really due to Schumer. She really puts herself out there. Very much like Cameron Diaz did in There's Something About Mary. Moments of self-deprecation. Embarrassing romantic moments.

So much of the film feels identifiable, fresh, fun and original. Solid laughs all around. Definitely one of the most genuinely funny comedies to come out in the past five years. The film has the signature Apatow theme of feeling a tad long; but it's forgivable because there are laughs to be had up until the final moments. Trainwreck has the honesty and edginess to call it this generations Annie Hall, or at least this generations Annie Hall as told by Amy Schumer. It breaks down the conventions of the modern romantic comedy. And just when you think it's going to take a turn down cliche Avenue, it jerks the wheel in the other direction. She's going places, that Amy Schumer.

Obvious Child

Gillian Robespierre, 2014

Can I Stream it?

3/5

Broken hearted from a recent break-up, stand-up Donna Stern (Jenny Slate) finds herself in a vulnerable state when she meets smart grad-student Max (Jake Lacy) after one of her shows. Their drunken night ends with her being pregnant, confused, and trying to figure out how to handle the situation after already having trouble managing her current life.

Some people might remember Jenny Slate from her short-lived Saturday Night Live days in 2009 and 2010. You will probably remember that they weren’t actually all that memorable. She failed to ever really make an impression there. It’s quite apparent now that Saturday Night Live wasn't the appropriate comedic vessel for Slate. She has appeared on various television series since, but has really resurfaced in the quite-good comedy FX series Married. In that particular series she plays Jess, best friend to main character Russ. She is married to an older man, played by Paul Reiser. And she’s really great there. Unrestrained and honest, unfiltered. In Obvious Child, she brings a similar energy to her Donna character but elevates it and ultimately appears to be more comfortable. Perhaps the self-deprecating Jewish 30-something living in New York City is a more accurate version of the real Jenny Slate? Very loose on stage in the small club, quick to make fun of herself. Funny, edgy, interesting. Constantly drinking too much, not really taking much of anything in her life seriously while many people her age are probably taking things too seriously. She’s not even remotely prepared to handle something as extreme as pregnancy, let alone motherhood. She takes her issues to the stage, regardless of how personal they may be. At times it comes off as pure comedy, other times it’s pure performance art. Obvious Child rattles the foundation of the conventional Hollywood rom-com with great writing and performances, challenges some cultural taboos and creates something more realistic and fresh, almost like an Anti-Knocked Up.

Enough Said

Nicole Holofcener

Can I Stream It?

3/5

Enough said doesnt do what a lot of modern Romantic Dramedies do in taking two mid-tier actors and confronting them with a far fetched premise. Instead here they take two great performers who have good on-screen chemistry and give them a far fetched premise. In a sense its like the best Meg Ryan movie shes never been in. The late great Gandolfini plays a version of his alternate dimension amazingly compelling story-thread guy Kevin Finnerty from the immortal Sopranos with his Albert character. He displays his range, and for the most part you never really feel like he is going to get physically threatening. This goes against the notion that after Sopranos he would forever be type-cast as the mob-boss with mommy issues (wow that is a wicked generalization isn't it?). It was ultimately unfair to typecast Gandolfini because he really did have a lot of other weapons in his arsenal. He brought the threatening force in films like True Romance or Killing Them Softly but then he would bring deliver more subdued but more elaborate characters in Where the Wild Things Are and Zero Dark Thirty. Here he is a man still exhausted from a toxic marriage. He is more than ready to move on and put the past nightmare behind him. It's really his wife who continues to beat his idiosyncrasies into the ground, without him there. Sometimes it almost feels like she's still married to him, but a ghost of him, after he's eagerly moved on with the next chapter of his life (not looking back either) and is no longer a physical presence in the house. The one thing that brings the two of them together is the fact that they are both at the same point in their lives: divorced, cynical, and raising college-aged kids.

Julia Louis-Dreyfuses character Eva is a bit more challenging. She has a healthier relationship with her ex, who has his own HBO background with the much short-lived forgotten-but-great Carnivale. But her relationship with her daughter Ellen (Tracey Fairaway) is befuddling and not really well laid-out. You know that there is tension between the two, and then there's a leap to Eva spending more time with Ellen's best friend. There isn't a lot in between that. And there probably should be. But at the end of the day, it's excusable and not really that important. What's more important is the chemistry between Eva and Albert feels real. It's a nice send-off for Gandolfini, even if it's not his last film (two more in post-production as of June of 2014). 

Warm Bodies

Jonathan Levine, 2013

Can I Stream It?

3/5

Young zombie "R" (Nicholas Hoult), who retains a sense of consciousness after turning undead, finds himself changing yet again after coming into contact with  living human Julie (Teresa Palmer).

Jonathan Levine's heavily-CGI'd Zom-Rom-Com takes the threadbare zombie genre and ultimately delivers a refreshing twist. In a plot that could be pitched as My Boyfriend's Back meets BBC's In the Flesh mini-series, Levine provides an engaging story that is delivered using a simple three-act structure where zombie gets girl, zombie loses girl, zombie gets girl back. Through elaborate digitally-constructed set-design, Warm Bodies reveals a dystopian graffiti-glazed landscape where humans are really faced with two opposing forces: quick-moving zombies and even-quicker zombie sub-class Boney's (who greatly resemble the creatures in I Am Legend). The streets, largely unforgiving, are closed off by a fortified wall protecting the remaining surviving humans from the hungry brain-eaters in the remnants of the old city. Levine creates zombies that hunt in packs and have routines. When they capture a meal they feast on the brain. This gives them the ability to absorb their memories, all of which is displayed through snappy editing in which you yourself feast on the eye candy of warmly-lit sentimental moments from the unfortunate victim's past.

It's not only what Levine does with the story that makes it work, it's also what he doesn't do. He doesn't dumb the film down by spending time explaining things to the newcomer. He effectively lays out the back-story by using R's narrative. He also doesn't make things unnecessarily complex either by making the often-used social statements or satirical notes like so many other zombie films. Instead, he introduces you to R, who can barely mumble a word in the first few minutes. It's a slow build. At first you're stuck in the confines of an airport fuselage listening to old Dylan LP's with him. But as R's heart begins to beat again, and the color slowly returns to his face, the story comes to life. By the climax, you're on board and wish you could be there with a baseball bat in your hands fighting alongside everyone. 

Drinking Buddies

Joe Swanberg, 2013

Can I Stream It?

2/5

It's quite obvious that Luke (Jake Johnson) and Kate (Olivia Wilde) have a crush on each other. They both spend a good portion of their days working at the Revolution Brewery in Chicago goofing around. The only problem that they face is that they are both already involved with someone else.

When you're pitched a film that's going to be 100% improvised, that probably sounds quite appealing and fun, especially when it involves actual drinking. But this is essentially a film packing empty calories much like the stouts and pale ales they are constantly consuming on the job. The Brewery seems like the best place in the world to work. You can drink during your shift, smoke in your office. It appears that the only real work you must do is hose off some kegs and make some phone calls to distributors. The only real boss you must answer to is Gene (Jason Sudeikis) who is hard to respect when he is sitting next to you at the bar every night drinking. Everything that transpires is quite predictable, and you can get a clear feeling for the direction it's going to take at the 20 minute mark. And while Luke and Kate are pulling pigtails, they aren't providing a whole lot of funny. The sexual tension drags on. And on. And on. It's disappointing because Olivia Wilde and Anna Kendrick have proven that they are capable of pulling off good performances but they aren't given much to work with here. And perhaps it's not fair to judge them so harshly, they are clearly just not great with improv. It's an hour of power of pleasure delaying, loosey-goosey to a fault, and simply lacking. Swanberg deserves some credit for taking a risk, but Drinking Buddies is better on paper. It provides you with a lot to look at, but not enough substance behind it.

About Time

Richard Curtis, 2013

Can I Stream It?

4/5

Tim (Domhnall Gleeson) is informed by his father (Bill Nighy) on his 21st birthday that he has inherited the ability to go back in time. He can go back to any moment that he has lived as long as he goes into a dark place, and clinches his fists and thinks about where he wants to go. Constantly feeling disappointed with himself over his inability to find a good girl, he decides to use his special power to find that special someone.

Richard Curtis puts together a heartwarming story that combines time travel with the unlikely romance theme, sort of like if Groundhog Day and Say Anything had a baby. The English backdrop adds a distinct charm to the film, fueled by rich & witty dialogue. It takes the sentimental tone of Curtis' popular Love Actually and makes it much more personal. You are introduced to Tim's fun-loving family very early on in the picture, and when Tim is pulled into the den to be told of his ability by his father, you get a clear sense that they are always having fun with each other. Tim initially assumes he's joking about the multi-generational family secret. He soon finds he is not, and wants to immediately travel back to clear up some social missteps that he had made that have been haunting him ever since. Tim possesses a certain charisma to him, which draws sympathy early on. His early social mishaps are painful to watch (like awkwardly avoiding the kiss at his family's New Years party), especially because he's a genuinely nice guy who simply lacks the moxie. His father asks him what he wants to use his ability for. There's an endless amount of morally questionable things he could do, but he simply wants the girl. He meets Mary (Rachel McAdams), who is insecure yet delightful. McAdams continues to prove that she's one of Hollywood's sweethearts, and really lights up this picture. And so the film plays out like a highlight reel of happiness with instant replay. The ability to correct life's worst moments, and possibly turn them into the greatest. And of course it's flawed; isn't EVERY time travel film flawed in one way or another? You have to let the imperfections go, and that's easy to do with this picture.

Love Actually

Richard Curtis, 2003

Netflix

2/5

This romantic comedy is a collection of very different lives. Very different lives all searching for the same thing. Love. As the Christmas holiday approaches, the pressure to have someone by their side is felt by everyone involved.

It's a film that carries a light load with a lot of star power. Love is the clear theme shown early on, and it's delivered in various flavors. Billy Mack (Bill Nighy), the aging punk rocker who just recorded a Christmas album and is feeling the loneliness of being a musician. A political aide who catches the attention of a freshman Prime Minister (Hugh Grant). Harry (Alan Rickman), a husband who has a flirtatious secretary that he hides from his wife Karen (Emma Thompson). A writer (Colin Firth) who employs a woman at his country retreat that he grows a fondness for. A pair of nude stunt doubles who spend a lot of uncomfortable time together (Martin Freeman and Joanna Page). A child (Thomas Brodie-Sangster) who has a crush on a classmate who seeks the love advice of his widowed father (Liam Neeson). A woman (Laura Linney) totally in love with a co-worker but doesn't have the courage to confess. A hodgepodge of different lives, intertwined. You get it. Lot's of stories. Almost like Crash without the drama and a lot of mistletoe, Christmas lights and ecstasy pills.

It's an ambitious film that's positively charged, but it's also very frustrating film at times. You would think that with such an ensemble cast that it would be a cakewalk. And they aren't to blame, the acting is actually quite fine. You feel yourself getting pulled into the emotional tone of the moment only to have the rug pulled out on you. You think to yourself, "this won't happen again" and then it does. Again and again. The erratic direction of each story-line never slows down enough for you to savor it. That and there's really just too many ongoing story-lines to begin with. You continue to feel starved for some kind of dilemma, while a lot of the characters get their happiness served to them on a silver platter. Clearly Curtis wasn't looking to settle into any dramatic moments, probably hoping to maintain a more light-hearted overall feel. But that makes it feel evasive. In the end the picture is as clumsy as an elementary school Christmas play.

Elizabethtown

Cameron Crowe, 2005

(REWATCHED)

3/5

Drew Baylor is a shoe designer who is feeling the guilt of a huge loss for his company. He assumes things can't get any worse for him, and then he receives a phone call from his sister telling him that his father died. He soon must travel to his father's hometown of Elizabethtown as the family comes together for the funeral. 

People over the years have horribly criticized Elizabethtown. And unfairly. Anyone who is a fan of Cameron Crowe's work can feel his presence in this. He's there. It's just that there's too much of him there. It's unfair to just completely dismiss Elizabethtown as a mess. It's not a mess. There's just TOO MUCH going on. Cameron Crowe obviously had a lot to say. But this should have been two movies. Maybe three. The story of losing his father, and returning home to Elizabeth. One film. And I know, Garden State. But Crowe would have executed that better than Zach Braff. Him meeting Claire on an airplane? It's a great story, it really is. But thats another film. Both stories were conflicting. They didn't blend well and didn't play nice with each other. It's a shame, because some of the scenes in this film feel so real. The late night phone conversation with Claire. The chaos of the cousins screaming in the tight house. The forced neurotic distractions by his mother. At times the characters in the film do feel like caricatures, but they are still placed in very real moments.

Too much teasing. By the time the funeral scene rolled around, Claire should have been pregnant. "I Like You" – they should have been and were in love at that point. Orlando Bloom is engaging, it's just a shame that Crowe over-used him. Transitional shots of him dancing on an iron bridge, aimlessly pacing through his hotel room. Let him play to his strengths. Let the story breathe. His character was complex, and a lot of the time you could just see it on his face.

The roadtrip scene in the final act is the dagger in the heart of Elizabethtown. The intended emotion to that chapter is lost because you are still feeling (or should be) the effects of the funeral. Instead of the film ending at the funeral, you now have to get in a car with Drew for 42 hours. In the end, it's probably a film that probably looked so good on paper. It has all of the qualities of a Cameron Crowe film. Great music, real love, real emotion. Unfortunately it was just scattered all over the place. Maybe the editor is to blame. Maybe its Crowe. Either way, there should have been meetings about this. There is the real possibility that Cameron Crowe could have had two great films here, instead he had one OKAY one.

Manhattan

Woody Allen, 1979

4/5

Woody Allen directs and stars in this classic black and white film about a writer who is torn between two relationships. One relationship is with a young seventeen year old girl named Tracy (Mariel Hemingway), and the other is with his best friend Yale's (Michael Murphy) mistress Mary (Diane Keaton).

The heavy-hearted dialogue is filled with intellectual grit and witty humor. The film explores the concept of opposites attracting. When Allen's character Isaac meets Mary for the first time, he acts as if he can't stand to hear her talk. The attraction grows, after lots of pigtail pulling. The highlights of Keaton's career are certainly her roles in Woody Allen's films, and she really provides an exceptional performance here consistent with her performance in Annie Hall two years earlier. Her confidence on screen is obvious. Hemingway is alluring as the innocent, introverted, culture-hungry high-schooler. Her character is a good example of the younger girl attached to the older man for what might possibly be the wrong reasons. She has no long-term relationships under her belt, and her lack of experience makes her vulnerable to Isaac's wise charm. Isaac successfully channels Allen's neurotic charm and quick banter. It's Woody Allen's love poem to one of his earliest muses - his dear hometown. So many beautiful images that could only be shown in black and white. The planetarium scene, the rain fall in Central Park, and the carriage ride also in Central Park. The skyline shots of with the array of illuminated squares. The classic shot of the bench in front of the Brooklyn Bridge. The deep blacks and the grainy grays are mesmerizing and effectively capture the Big Apple in the late 1970's. It's certainly one of his more inviting films. Romantic comedies are certainly his wheel-house, and he's effective at telling a story of a group of people completely preoccupied by their pursuit of love in his beloved Manhattan. 

Straight A's

James Cox, 2013


2/5

Black sheep Scott (Ryan Phillippe) arrives on horseback to his wealthy brother's house to try to make amends after having a vision of his deceased mother telling him to do so. Old tension resurfaces, mainly due to the fact that Scott's brother William (Luke Wilson) is now married to Scott's high school sweetheart Katherine (Anna Paquin).

Like so many of the romantic dramedies that get churned out these days, Straight A's attempts to run on bad writing combined with run-of-the-mill acting. The final product feels unpredictable and uninspired, and director Cox (Wonderland) and writer David Cole are to blame. In the end they make a film that is bearable but unadorned. Ryan Phillippe pulls off a good southern accent, one of the few redeeming qualities of the film. Wilson and Paquin clearly didn't have a lot to work with, and they fall flat here. Anna Paquin's stone-faced performance feels one-dimensional and she's yet to shine outside of the Sookie Stackhouse comfort zone. There's one point in the film where she blows up, showing that she can cover both sides of the emotional spectrum but nothing in between. The mature son who wears the suit all of the time feels like a direct rip-off of Augusten Burrough's character in Running with Scissors but without any of the charm. Powers Boothe is in what almost feels like a throw-away role, and somehow Cox even made him seem dull. The only really good acting in the film was provided by Gracie (Ursula Parker), who some will recognize from the television series Louie. The dialogue is completely elementary, and the story is even more predictable. The transitions feel forced, and lack any kind of organic feel. The "surprise" twist in the end really feels like they needed to quickly tie up loose ends so they wouldn't be late for lunch that day. In this world of over-used premises and other rom-com low-hanging fruit, this film gets lost in the forgettable crowd.

Friends With Kids

Jennifer Westfeldt, 2011


 2/5

 

          Jason Fryman (Adam Scott) and Julie Keller (Jennifer Westfeldt), best friends since college, are enjoying their bachelor status. They watch as their four best friends transition to a life with children. They quickly see their laid-back lifestyles erode and become frantic, tense and stressed. Their once stylish New York apartments are now filled with tipped-over plastic firetrucks on the floor and toddler screams echoing the walls. But they are also getting the itch to have children of their own. They decide to experiment with an idea of having children together as friends, but continuing to maintain their serial dating lives while raising the child and splitting all of the costs down the middle.
          From a film-making perspective, there is so much quick-cutting early on that it is hard to maintain focus. The backdrop of New York City provides a nice visual aesthetic to the film, but it lacks all of the charm and sincerity of some other romantic comedies filmed in New York (ie. When Harry Met Sally, Annie Hall). The tense dynamic of Leslie (Maya Rudolph) and Alex's (Chris O'Dowd) relationship seems cartoonish, like caricatures of a married couple with the resigned husband and the nagging wife, reminiscent of Everybody Loves Raymond. You get excited to see so many of the cast-members from Bridesmaids, but the comparison between the two films is night and day.
          Ultimately the film seems too far-fetched and unrealistic. While the plot itself feels original, the story becomes predictable. There is also some bad acting that really takes you out of the moment. There is a plot-hole late in the film that feels lazy, followed by a poor ending. There is already an over-saturation of mediocre romantic comedies out there, and here is another one that can join the herd. 

Safety Not Guaranteed

Colin Trevorrow, 2012

4/5

Aubrey Plaza, Jake Johnson, Karan Soni and Mark Duplass star in this film about a magazine doing a piece on a Craigslist ad from a mystery man looking for a companion to go back in time with. The film jumps right into the introduction of Plaza's character Darius. Darius is a sad sap, still living at home, who is looking for a minimum wage job to spark some kind of progression in her life. She settles for an intern gig at Seattle magazine. She has immediate interest in the investigative piece on the time travel ad, and ends up going away for a few days with the two other men who work for the magazine. One guy is the misogynistic frat-guy type who has the ulterior motive of hooking up with an old fling while they are away (even though it was his idea to pursue the Craigslist ad), and the other guy is an intellectual Middle-Eastern introvert in his early twenties. He's only working for the magazine to add some extra color to a presumably long list of academic and occupational achievements on his resume.

From a cinematic perspective the film is cleanly edited, has witty dialogue, good music and a genuine romantic element.  I am REALLY picky with comedies these days - in fact I don't even remember the last really good one I've seen. I was happy to see Mark Duplass outside of The League, and he seems to have some range because his character Kenneth was quite distant from his League character Pete. I was really impressed with Aubrey Plaza's performance. She fits nicely into that category of comedic actresses who play on that awkward/uncomfortable theme (Kristen Wiig, Amy Poehler, Kristen Schaal).

The films in the "romantic comedy/time travel" genre do not have a lot of company... So you're already in pretty unfamiliar territory when making a film like this. It also puts you in the company of films like Back to the Future, so there are also high expectations. This film succeeded in the sense that it doesn't even matter if the time machine exists. The humor hits when it needs to and the love feels real.

Adventureland

Greg Mottola, 2009

3/5

Adventureland is the often traveled late-teen/early 20's love story. The film is set in the 1980's, although the only feature that seems to remind you of that is the soundtrack (Lou Reed, The Cure, Bowie, Falco) that is very forced. Jesse Eisenberg is Jesse Eisenberg like he is in EVERY other film. I don't have a huge problem with that (I guess I don't in any of his films) - he satisfies me in his role as James Brennan. James is awkward,   tense & insecure. James is hard-up for cash and works at the local theme park "Adventureland". Adventureland is run by Bobby & Paulette, played by Bill Hader and Kristen Wiig. Any fans of them will feel satisfied with their quirky comedic roles. Kristen Stewart is impressive in her role as Em Lewin. Kristen Stewart is perfect at playing the introverted, conflicted and mysterious love interest. I hope she is picky with her future acting roles, now that shes had a nice pay-day from those AWFUL Twilight films. She has a natural ability that seems quite evident. Memorable shot in the film: Bumper car scene (my favorite scene in the film). Although flawed, repetitive, and predictable - Adventureland is endearing, entertaining and funny.

Moonrise Kingdom

Wes Anderson, 2012

4/5

First off, I'll just say I'm a big Wes Anderson fan and I'll see anything he makes. Some say hes over-rated. I think some people just want to have a contrarian attitude with him. He creates these beautiful worlds in his films that I would love to spend some time in. This film is full of that same innocence, colorful, dry & quirky elements that are in all of his other films. They jump right into it with the camera panning through the summer camp with Ed Norton inspecting the various scout stations. The camp is settled on a fictional New England island. I wish it was a real place. I'd spend my summers there.

Sleepwalk With Me

Mike Birbiglia, 2012

4/5

I really enjoyed this film. Good direction, good acting and a good soundtrack. You watch as a not-so-good comedian (a character loosely based on Birbiglia) works on his chops and refuses to turn down a gig with the fear of not getting another offer from a manipulative, mid-tier manager. Lauren Ambrose's performance was particularly good as the love interest. Ambrose, who I haven't seen in a while, was probably the best actor on HBO's Six Feet Under and was clearly the best actor in this film. I am usually not a fan of actors breaking down the fourth wall, but Birbiglia's character did it in a way that was reminiscent of Woody Allen in Annie Hall. Like Annie Hall, the film follows the struggles of two people in a relationship who aren't necessarily looking for the same things, and are distracted by other factors in their lives. Oh, and the lead has a sleep disorder that causes him to sleepwalk - which added a nice comedic element to the film that I did not get tired of (no pun intended).