The countdown continues!
Essentially everything from here on out may have redeeming qualities, even if it is this far down the list.
#51 Bad Teacher
Much was made of the very public breakup of Cameron Diaz and Justin Timberlake a few years back. Thank goodness for the rest of us though--they were able to make it work and thus churn out a crap movie together! Should Bad Teacher be called Pretty Bad Movie? Possibly, though at times Diaz's antics made me laugh. The set-up: She's Miss Elizabeth Halsey, a completely shallow and self-centered gold-digger who gets dumped by her gold-diggee and goes back to work as a teacher in order to save up for breast implants. Along comes substitute Scott DeLacorte (Timberlake), an innocent young do-gooder looking to advance his career and she wants him. Unfortunately for Miss Halsey, gym teacher Mr. Gettis (a super-underutilized Jason Segel) is pursuing her, and model teacher Ms. Squirrell (Lucy Punch) lands Mr. Delacorte. Once she hears that a cash bonus will be given to the teacher whose students post the best test scores, Ms. Halsey will stop at nothing to wreck Ms. Squirrell, steal away Mr. Delacorte, and get the money she needs. Cameron Diaz has a few pretty hilarious one-liners and Segel is reliable as always, but he deserves far more screen time and Timberlake's nerd was sort of tough for me to buy.
#50 Unknown
Liam Neeson's The Grey marks the third straight year in which he has starred in a January film that is solely a vehicle for him to kick some asses using, as said in Taken, his "unique set of skills". This installment of the Liam Neeson January Action Film genre unfortunately features another January in actress January Jones, who, while very attractive, is untalented as hell behind the camera save some decent work in Mad Men. Unknown follows Neeson as Martin Harris, a renowned biochemist set to give a talk in Berlin. As he and his wife (Jones) arrive at the hotel, he realizes his briefcase with all of his identification was left at the airport. On the way back to the hotel, his cab crashes into the river, he ends up in a four day coma and checks out of the hospital to go back deliver his report. When he gets there, his wife no longer knows him and is now on the arm of fake Martin Harris, played by Aidan Quinn. From there, a whole lot of "But..but...you're my wife!" and "No, I've never met you before," ensues. With no one believing him, he goes to track down the cab driver (Diane Kruger) and start getting some answers via the kicking of asses. There is definitely a conspiracy here, and he's going to figure it out, dammit, or else his name isn't Liam Neeson.
#49 Lincoln Lawyer
Matthew McCounaghey is Mick Haller, a defense attorney who works out of his Lincoln Town Car. He is hired to defend Hollywood playboy Louis Roulet (Ryan Phillipe), who has been charged with an assault on a prostitute. Over the course of the investigation, Haller's cop buddy Frank Levin (William H. Macy) makes some interesting discoveries that put both he and Haller in danger. From there, the Driving Defender (you see what I did there?) fights to stay alive and stay one step ahead of his pursuers. McCounaghey turns in a good performance, as does William H. Macy (as per usual) and there are some exciting moments, but for the most part the resolution feels kind of flat and predictable.
#48 Paul
As a duo, Nick Frost and Simon Pegg have a history of taking on the supernatural and turning it into comedy. Their breakout hit, 2004's zombie comedy Shaun of the Dead put them on the map and their careers have both grown considerably from there. Pegg used the momentum to turn in whip-smart tech-y roles in the Mission Impossible series and as Scotty in the Star Trek reboot, while Frost has been thrown more often than not into the dunderheaded big-guy role (see Pirate Radio). Along with Hot Fuzz, Paul marks their third time starring in a film together, and their chemistry continues to work. Paul follows Graeme(Pegg) and Clive (Frost), two space-obsessed nerds who leave Comic-Con to go try and track down famous alien sites such as Roswell and Area 51. Along the way, they come upon a car crash and there encounter Paul, a slacker/stoner alien voiced by slacker/stoner Seth Rogen. They agree to give him a ride in their RV as he regales them with stories of being Spielberg's advisor on E.T. and running from the government as they are trying to get the information out of his brain and a grasp of his regenerative powers. The rest of the story follows the gang (joined by a repressed and religious Kristen Wiig, the daughter of the RV park owner) as they try to outrun the government operatives (Jason Bateman and Will Hader) and get to the place where Paul's ship first crashed. Some gags work, some fall short, and all in all it is the weakest of the Pegg/Frost trio. Still an entertaining watch and a fun concept.
More tomorrow!
title
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Monday, January 30, 2012
2011 Films: #55-52
Welcome to the 2011 edition of Mulhern at the Movies.
"We're going to make two movies with the exact same plot, and get this--we'll release them at the exact same time. Don't worry, it's going to be awesome." -Hollywood
Portman/Kutcher's version of the "let's be friends who have sex with each other and try and pull off the whole no emotional ties thing" is weaker than the Timberlake/Kunis version. Natalie Portman is in her medical residency who wants something not serious because she has no time. Kutcher is a production assistant on a TV show who is young and wants to be unattached. Uh-oh. Is it possible-and I'm just throwing this out there-they will come to realize they need each other?
More movies tomorrow. See you then!
As some of you know, I have a had a pretty exciting few months. I finished up my graduate schooling and am in the process of obtaining a teaching license. The last two months of my student teaching took place in Moshi, Tanzania. And I spent a week in Barcelona on my way home.
That said, I am currently piecing together income as I wait for my license to arrive. I am tutoring twice a week at a middle school, subbing at my old job, Minneapolis Kids, and have begun writing a food column for the Minneapolis edition of examiner.com, entitled This Way to Delicious. For a shameless plug, the first article is here:
The spotty employment that was recently more like unemployment has been beneficial for my creativity, and almost as importantly, has allowed me to catch up on all the movies I have missed while I was out of the country.
By Oscar time, I will have seen 55 movies this year. The breakdown is as follows:
In theaters: 32
At home: 20
On an airplane: 3
2011 was another solid year for film. Franchise films and comic-book movies of course continued to smoke everything else in the box office, with Harry Potter 8, Transformers 3 and Pirates of the Caribbean 4 each hauling in over a billion dollars worldwide. Two very impressive newcomers in Jessica Chastain (The Help, The Debt, The Tree of Life, Take Shelter) and Michael Fassbender (Shame, A Dangerous Method, X Men First Class) made big waves with their performances. Directors we haven't heard from in many years (The Descendant's Alexander Payne, The Tree of Life's Terrence Malick) brought us great new films, and first-time directors (Bellflower's Evan Glodell, Stuck Between Stations' Brady Kiernan) showed a ton of promise in their ballsy debuts. And for the first time maybe ever, a silent film in The Artist is the front-runner for the academy's best picture of the year.
2011 was also the year that Ryan Gosling got his due. He is the best young actor in Hollywood, and it's not even close. Fresh off of last year's Oscar snub for Blue Valentine (the best performance of the year), he turned in critically revered performances in The Ides of March, Crazy, Stupid, Love and Drive. The Golden Globes, who have characteristically been more apt to take note of Gosling than the Academy, nominated him twice-for Ides and for Crazy, Stupid, Love. He was nominated for the fantastic and barely-seen Half Nelson in 2006, eventually losing to Forest Whitaker in The Last King of Scotland, which was also a snub in my opinion. People are finally taking notice of just how good this kid is, and it is about damn time.
I plan to crank out 5 write-ups a day over the course of the week so that I can get moving. Movies 55-31 will be short reviews, 30-21 will be a couple paragraphs, 20-11 a couple more, and so on.
Ready? Go.
#55 I Don't Know How She Does It
The "working mom tries to balance her life and family" plot is so contrived and predictable that it borderline offensive. The ensemble backing Mrs. Broderick is decently talented. Greg Kinnear is the beleaguered husband, Christina Hendricks is the Sex and the City-like pal, Pierce Brosnan is the powerful business tycoon that she forms a new partnership with, and Olivia Munn is her no-nonsense assistant. SJP gets a new job, flirts with Pierce Brosnan, goes out of town a bunch on business, neglects her needy artist husband and by association her children, and freaks out about everything. There are also misplaced The Office-style interviews with many of the characters assessing the situation, which add next to nothing to the movie's direction. At one point, her character runs out of time and needs to bring a dessert for some parent-teacher thing, so she buys an apple pie and smushes it up so it looks homemade. Gah. The Carrie Bradshaw era is over for Sarah Jessica Parker, and instead of finding ways to get out of the working-girl typecast, people like me find themselves predicting and saying her exact dialogue while eating on international flights trying not to get bread crumbs everywhere because the butter is not soft enough. Did other passengers look at me? Absolutely. But it didn't change the fact the script was hokey enough to literally say out loud beforehand.
The "working mom tries to balance her life and family" plot is so contrived and predictable that it borderline offensive. The ensemble backing Mrs. Broderick is decently talented. Greg Kinnear is the beleaguered husband, Christina Hendricks is the Sex and the City-like pal, Pierce Brosnan is the powerful business tycoon that she forms a new partnership with, and Olivia Munn is her no-nonsense assistant. SJP gets a new job, flirts with Pierce Brosnan, goes out of town a bunch on business, neglects her needy artist husband and by association her children, and freaks out about everything. There are also misplaced The Office-style interviews with many of the characters assessing the situation, which add next to nothing to the movie's direction. At one point, her character runs out of time and needs to bring a dessert for some parent-teacher thing, so she buys an apple pie and smushes it up so it looks homemade. Gah. The Carrie Bradshaw era is over for Sarah Jessica Parker, and instead of finding ways to get out of the working-girl typecast, people like me find themselves predicting and saying her exact dialogue while eating on international flights trying not to get bread crumbs everywhere because the butter is not soft enough. Did other passengers look at me? Absolutely. But it didn't change the fact the script was hokey enough to literally say out loud beforehand.
#54 Hall Pass
The Farrelly Brothers steady downhill tumble since the Dumb and Dumber era continues in possibly their most ridiculous premise to date. Rick (Owen Wilson) and Fred (Jason Sudekis) get permission from their wives to have a week off of marriage to help spice up their lives. The wives-Christina Applegate and Jenna Fischer, are good actresses who are underutilized despite subplots in which they form relationships with other men in the absence of the party boys. As you can imagine, they do drugs, get drunk, try to hit on women with varying success, and learn valuable life lessons along the way. Been done before, and much better, by their frat pack brethren in Old School.
Jesse Eisenberg? Aziz Ansari? Danny McBride? What could possibly go wrong? A lot, actually. It's possible that this movie ended up being a victim of my higher expectations, or maybe I was in a pissed-off mood at the time. Who knows. Either way, I laughed a couple of times, chuckled a couple of times, and was disappointed a lot of times. Eisenberg and Ansari play Nick and Chet, high school friends, pizza delivery driver and substitute teacher respectively. Danny McBride's character Dwayne is almost exactly like Kenny Powers in every way, just not any of the funny kind. Then there's Nick Swardson, obnoxious as ever as Dwayne's younger brother. In order to kill their father and inherit his millions, they first have to raise 100,000 to hire an assassin. So they order a pizza out to a secret lair (junkyard), knock Nick out, strap a bomb to his chest and order him to rob a bank. Yeah, I thought it was kind of stupid too.
The Farrelly Brothers steady downhill tumble since the Dumb and Dumber era continues in possibly their most ridiculous premise to date. Rick (Owen Wilson) and Fred (Jason Sudekis) get permission from their wives to have a week off of marriage to help spice up their lives. The wives-Christina Applegate and Jenna Fischer, are good actresses who are underutilized despite subplots in which they form relationships with other men in the absence of the party boys. As you can imagine, they do drugs, get drunk, try to hit on women with varying success, and learn valuable life lessons along the way. Been done before, and much better, by their frat pack brethren in Old School.
#53 30 Minutes or Less
Jesse Eisenberg? Aziz Ansari? Danny McBride? What could possibly go wrong? A lot, actually. It's possible that this movie ended up being a victim of my higher expectations, or maybe I was in a pissed-off mood at the time. Who knows. Either way, I laughed a couple of times, chuckled a couple of times, and was disappointed a lot of times. Eisenberg and Ansari play Nick and Chet, high school friends, pizza delivery driver and substitute teacher respectively. Danny McBride's character Dwayne is almost exactly like Kenny Powers in every way, just not any of the funny kind. Then there's Nick Swardson, obnoxious as ever as Dwayne's younger brother. In order to kill their father and inherit his millions, they first have to raise 100,000 to hire an assassin. So they order a pizza out to a secret lair (junkyard), knock Nick out, strap a bomb to his chest and order him to rob a bank. Yeah, I thought it was kind of stupid too.
#52 No Strings Attached
"We're going to make two movies with the exact same plot, and get this--we'll release them at the exact same time. Don't worry, it's going to be awesome." -Hollywood
Portman/Kutcher's version of the "let's be friends who have sex with each other and try and pull off the whole no emotional ties thing" is weaker than the Timberlake/Kunis version. Natalie Portman is in her medical residency who wants something not serious because she has no time. Kutcher is a production assistant on a TV show who is young and wants to be unattached. Uh-oh. Is it possible-and I'm just throwing this out there-they will come to realize they need each other?
More movies tomorrow. See you then!
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