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Crazy, Stupid Love *** It must be Ryan Gosling's breakout summer - 2011. (I saw three movies in a row all with Ryan in them). I thought this romantic comedy was truly fun. A guy is getting divorced, he meets another guy in a bar, who teaches him how to be cool again, and guess what, he wins his wife back, all because of Ryan. Ah. The storyline is predictable, but it's one that we like. I love it when Ryan actually talks. See this one. The
Debt *** This is a spy movie set in two time periods, the 1960s cold war era in Israel, and modern times. We go back and forth between these two eras, finally piecing together what really happened when an Israeli spy team captures a WWII Nazi holdout. With spy movies there are always "levels": there is always a surface plot, their actual assignment; and then underneath, there is some kind of cover up, trickery, or double-dealing that muddies up the water, a sort of morality play, that tarnishes everything. Helen Mirren is in this one, brilliant as always. It's a thriller, but as with many spy movies, it takes lots of time getting to the thrilling part. I really liked this movie though. Loved the look of the 1960s recreation, as well as the modern era. Well done. Good story. The spies seem real this time. I'm hoping to see some Oscar buzz about this movie. The
Descendants *** I love Clooney, so when somebody asked me if I wanted to see this movie I jumped at the chance. For some odd reason I thought it was going to be a comedy. Far from it. The story is about a wife on life support surrounded by her dysfunctional family. Not really a set-up for laughs, right? Nope. Each family member represents one stereotypical family bad sheep -- from bickering teenagers to greedy in-laws -- we've all got them in our families, so we recognize them. But that's okay. Sometimes stereotypes are a good thing, it saves time because we don't need a lot of personal background information. The story is set in Hawaii, yummy. Love that too. George actually feels right in the part. (Maybe he lives there in real life. Who cares, right?) Hawaii is more complicated than most tourists realize, which sort of rings true in this movie. The backstory is about missionary lands coming out of those long enduring trusts (something I know about...loved that part.) I wouldn't actually put this movie up for an Oscar, but 2011 hasn't been all that great a year for movies, so chances are we're going to hear some buzz about this one.
Drive ** It's Ryan Gosling, doing an early Steve McQueen one-note samba through this entire film. It is billed as a mystery-thriller. Really? So slow moving that you have to pinch yourself to stay awake. Ryan is mutely working on his thousand yard stare through the whole thing. He's a driver, he does "get aways" for bad guys, as a living. There's not much of a story, so the film drags itself from scene to scene to the point where you can actually feel the director thinking, "now what should I do next?" The acting is painful, because the actors are given so little dialog to work with. Yet the story hangs together, sort of. It seems long, but it's only 100 minutes of painful plodding. It might have been a technical success, but as story, pul-eese. We've seen this plot hundreds of times on TV already. Ides
of March *** George Clooney and company are politicians this time. It's the rough, ugly, under belly of political campaigns. Sort of reminded me of The West Wing, only seamier. Campaign managers have rotten jobs, but I'm thinking we only know the half of it. (I can only imagine what Rick Perry's campaign manager went through, or Gingrich's, for that matter. Yikes!) You will need a shower after this one, it's that grim, but they had trouble with the plotting. I would rather watch moral dilemmas that have to do with political issues rather than what they hung this storyline on. Sigh. The story gets too hokey to propell this one into the Oscar ranks, in my humble opinion.
Larry Crowne *
Midnight in Paris ****
Mission Impossible 4: ghost protocol *** I actually liked this movie. The storyline, what there was of it, was possible to follow, and Tom Cruise did a very good job. He runs funny, huh? But he's in good shape and was credible, in this rather incredible plot to blow up the world. You really do have to suspend your disbelief because the scenes simply do not hang together if you stop to think about them at all. And nobody in real life could take the physical punishment that this MI crew is subjected to. It doesn't matter because this was a really entertaining movie. Since this is the 4th in the series, there should be no more storylines and the stars should be too old for their parts. This one is the exception.
Tinker, Taylor, Soldier, Spy * Maybe I'm the only one who thought this movie was dreadful, but to me it was almost unwatchable, a terrible waste of time. It was impossible to follow the storyline, there was very little story and all characters moved in slow motion. Even the camera was bored and kept drifting around the set looking for something to film, because the actors sure weren't moving. We spent what seems like hours watching actors looking out of windows, staring at nothing. The camera followed an elevator that moved documents from floor to floor several times, even though that elevator had nothing whatever to do with the story. The sets were lovely though, M16 (British Intelligence) must be the dustiest, dreariest, and most untidy spy shop in the world. And of course, like most spy stories, the story is about a mole. Spies spend most of their time trying to figure out which spy is disloyal. Governments are spending our precious tax dollars on spies who are dithering around trying to find the disloyal spy among the spies. What rot!
Tower Heist *** I liked this movie, sort of a comedy-thriller, starring Eddie Murphy (yeah!). Good story set up for the "heist". Loved the Bernie Madoff references. So timely. Of course, because it's an Eddie Murphy bit, the film eventually goes over the cliff, but we expect that, so it's okay. If you'd like to have some fun watching a movie that really doesn't insult your intelligence, see this one. |
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