Tag: reviews

MOVIE REVIEW: The Help

No, the Help does not solve the issues of race in America; it was not designed to do so.

The Wife and I went to see the movie The Help a couple of Saturdays ago in a very crowded room at the Spectrum Theatre in Albany. We had been looking forward to seeing it since we caught the trailer. Our anticipation was further enhanced by happening to catch Bryce Dallas Howard, who plays the primary “villain”, for lack of a better term, on CTV while we were in Toronto a couple of weeks back, describing her role as “delicious.”

And I was going to write my impressions right away, but I got distracted by issues in the press surrounding the movie and the book upon which it was based. They are that essentially it’s a white woman who wrote about the black experience, with the film being the latest example of Hollywood’s historically lunkheaded, white-guilt appeasement genre.

Well, I’ve not read the book. As for the issues of the movie, I don’t think they were making a documentary, so if the moviemakers didn’t get it 100% correctly, that’s OK; most Hollywood films don’t. Beyond that, though, there were some well-meaning white people in America in 1962, even in the South, even in Jackson, Mississippi, so making the one of the white leads as heroic (in vast contrast to most whites in the film) doesn’t make it some sort of sellout. No, it does not solve the issues of race in America; it was not designed to do so.

Anyway, let me tell you how I immediately felt after seeing the film: the first 1/5 was interesting but not particularly engaging. The last 80%, though, I either laughed or gasped or cried. I enjoyed it on that level; actually, I liked it quite a bit. The acting was universally fine, but especially Viola Davis, who just might get an Oscar nod.

From Rotten Tomatoes: The Help stars Emma Stone as Skeeter, Viola Davis as Aibileen, and Octavia Spencer as Minny-three very different, extraordinary women in Mississippi during the 1960s, who build an unlikely friendship around a secret writing project that breaks societal rules and puts them all at risk. From their improbable alliance, a remarkable sisterhood emerges, instilling all of them with the courage to transcend the lines that define them, and the realization that sometimes those lines are made to be crossed-even if it means bringing everyone in town face-to-face with the changing times. — (C) DreamWorks

This was a film about people who were invisible, black maids who often raised white children, eventually finding a voice through a crazy notion of college-grad-returns-home Skeeter, who is faced additionally with the mystery of why her family’s maid (played by the terrific Cicely Tyson) had suddenly left. At 145 minutes, it IS too long, but I didn’t find it histrionic as some did. Perhaps this is true, though: “It is a formulaic Hollywood feel-bad and then feel-good work, one in which beautifully bathed-in-sunlight characters say Very Important Things while the music swells.” As I said, I liked it anyway, especially with smaller roles by Alison Janney, Jessica Chastain, and others.
***
Yet another movie controversy: Is gaining 15 pounds really “torture”? Actresses pack it on and lose it again for “The Help” — what’s the big deal?

MOVIE REVIEW: Buck

What I did come away with is that I’d like to know people like Buck, BE more like Buck.

The Wife and I left the Adirondacks on Saturday, picked up the mail that was being held. And since the Daughter was still in the mountains with her cousins (and their parents and grandparents), we took the opportunity to go to the Spectrum Theatre to see the movie Buck, which we had seen in previews.

Buck Brannaman travels the country for 40 exhausting months a year, usually without his family, “helping horses with people problems.” As Buck put it, “Your horse is a mirror to your soul, and sometimes you may not like what you see. Sometimes, you will.”

For much of the movie, one might mistake it for a laconic documentary travelogue. But interspersed with an early scene of how Robert Redford probably could not have made this movie “The Horse Whisperer”, based in large part on Buck, without the real Buck’s skills, and you realize that the man is genuine and no “one-trick pony,” as one critic suggested.

Then you find out, in a manner like peeling an onion one layer at a time, how Buck, and his older brother, were performers as children. Their mother died early, and their father – well, let’s say, Buck wasn’t his biggest fan. But the lessons he learned from that experience were what is remarkable.

It’s not a really dramatic film, except for one sequence near the end, which is quite so. What I did come away with is that I’d like to know people like Buck, BE more like Buck. You don’t have to be a big fan of horses to be a big fan of Buck.

Oh, you people who leave at the beginning of the credits: hear Buck’s foster mom tell Buck’s favorite joke before you depart.

Movie Review: Beginners

The Jack Russell terrier got the best lines.

If you like your movie to start at the beginning and end at the end, you’ll hate Beginners.

Let me back up. Around the 4th of July, when the Wife and Daughter went to visit my parents-in-law, I asked the Wife what films she wanted to see together, and she picked Midnight in Paris and Beginners. Then a couple of weeks later, she said, “Guess what film I saw at the movies today? ‘Beginners’.”

OK. So I ended going alone on a hot Sunday afternoon to the Spectrum Theatre, using an old movie pass I discovered in a drawer not that long ago.
Beginners is the story of Oliver (Ewan McGregor), who is still mourning the death of his father Hal (Christopher Plummer). It was only after Oliver’s mother dies that he gets close to Hal, who, at the age of 75, finally came out of the closet and enjoyed his final years. Oliver meets the mysterious Anna (Mélanie Laurent) and wonders if he can devote himself to loving her with the same wild abandon that his father showed at the end. Goran Visnjic also plays a significant role.

A fair portion of the movie involved young Oliver, in flashback (Keegan Boos) dealing with his quirky mother Georgia (the wonderful Mary Page Keller).

I really cared about these people. That’s probably a function of writer/director Mike Mills, who was mining his own experiences. It’s billed as a comedy/drama, and it did have a few good laughs; the Jack Russell terrier got the best lines. It certainly wasn’t raucously funny, and it is a bit oddly uneventful in parts. And for reasons known only to me, I kept thinking that McGregor looked a lot like Jason Bateman in some shots. Beginners is an uneven film. but it has enough insights to mildly recommend.

MOVIE REVIEW: Midnight in Paris

I loved Woody Allen’s pictures. Annie Hall is my favorite, but I’m also fond of many other of his films from the 1970s and 1980s. But at some point, somewhere in the mid-1990s, they became really hit or miss for me. Now I only go if they are reasonably reviewed. So when last year’s You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger got mediocre reviews, I just passed on it, unseen. Bad Woody is painful Woody, because it really reminds me of what was.

So when Midnight in Paris got some positive feedback, I got the Wife to go to the Spectrum Theatre for a Tuesday night show; the Daughter was at the grandparents’ house.

And I loved it. The Wife loved it. This is my favorite Woody film since perhaps Purple Rose of Cairo. But I have a difficult time talking about it because the less you know, the better it’ll be.

I will say that Midnight in Paris is about an engaged couple, Gil and Inez (Owen Wilson, Rachel McAdams) visiting Paris. Gil is a hack Hollywood writer who wants to create something more substantial and is finding his current location serving as his muse. Her friend Paul (played wonderfully by Michael Sheen) defines “pedantic”. Carla Bruni, the first lady of France (pictured with Wilson and Allen), adds context as a tour guide.

But the best parts are driven by Kathy Bates, Adrien Brody, and a group of actors I was unfamiliar with, especially Corey Stoll as Ernest. Not to mention Marion Cotillard, who I last saw as Edith Piaf in La Vie en Rose, who plays a pivotal role.

This isn’t exactly sunny Woody, but it is engaging Woody, an evolving Woody, or Woody proxy in the surprisingly believable Wilson, whose sole voiceover early on could have been spoken by the writer/director 30 years ago. The film also LOOKS brighter than most Allen films, which works here.

MOVIE REVIEW: Bridesmaids

Annie’s mom was played by the late Jill Clayburgh, and that made me a little sad as well.

The Wife and I have been to but one film since February, that being Made in Dagenham in April. It wasn’t for lack of movies we’ve wanted to see, but rather a lack of people to watch the child.

So when we had the chance to finally go on our (not-quite-) monthly date Saturday afternoon, July 2, we decided to go to the movies. I was surprised to discover that my demure bride chose Bridesmaids, which was on my list, especially since it’d been around for a while.

After dropping off the Daughter at a friend’s house, we went to the 12:35 pm showing at the Spectrum in Albany. The Spectrum is more an art-house theater but it shows mass-market films too, to balance the bottom line.

I should note that of the three movies in preview, the one I’d most like to see is Buck, which is a true story of a horse whisperer.

As for Bridesmaids, it was not really what I expected. It was a Judd Apatow film, so I anticipated it to be gross, but it wasn’t as raucous as I assumed. Or maybe I’ve gotten inured to it. The most tasteless sequence actually made some sense in the context of the movie.

Annie (Kristen Wiig, who co-wrote the screenplay, along with Annie(!) Mumolo) is a young woman with a failed business, weird roommates, a dead-end job she got because of her mother, and an unsatisfactory relationship (an uncredited Jon Hamm). But her BFF Lillian (Saturday Night Live alum Maya Rudolph) has gotten engaged, and Annie’s the maid of honor. She soon gets into a competition with Lillian’s much newer friend Helen (Rose Byrne), from which much of the comedy ensues.

The real revelation here is Melissa McCarthy. My wife and I watched seven seasons of Gilmore Girls, where she played the sweet friend Sookie, but my wife did not recognize her here as the take-no-prisoners sister of the groom, Megan. She was probably the best part of the picture. Not incidentally, the guy she sits with within the plane sequence, one of the funnier parts of the film, is played by Ben Falcone, Melissa’s real-life husband.

Mostly though, I thought that Annie was sad, and she was having a nearly movie-long pity party. Not that I didn’t think she was “real”, only that she wasn’t that much fun to be around. Or maybe it was me. Somewhere near the end, a couple of women behind us were laughing hysterically over something in the film, to which I said, as Annie might have, “Really?”

Also, Annie’s mom was played by the late Jill Clayburgh, and that made me a little sad as well.

Still, I “cared” about many of the characters, and I liked the ending. I’m glad I saw it, though I think my wife liked it better than I did.

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