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I don’t know how much more there is to say about Juno. Through Oscar season we had the hype, the acclaim, the backlash, the backlash to the backlash… All I can say is that I loved the movie and that it was one of the few films I saw that I immediately wanted to see again.
Most of the controversy seems to revolve around the script. Is the dialogue too cutesy, are the characters too quirky? I don’t think so. The first five minutes smacked of trying too hard, but throughout I thought it adeptly walked the line to keep it from becoming too precious. Too much time has been spent complaining that Juno doesn’t speak realistically. Um, it’s a movie. No one in a movie talks realistically! Real people don’t have the coherence, dramatic touch, or comedic timing of movie characters. But, honestly, Juno doesn’t talk all that weirdly. Yes she doesn’t talk like a normal teenager, but she does talk like a self-absorbed, know-it-all, cocky, hip teen who thinks she’s awesome… which is exactly what Juno is! A viewing companion mentioned that he couldn’t believe that Juno would think Mark wouldn’t know Mott the Hoople. I think a sixteen-year-old who thinks she knows everything about music would definitely make that mistake. Teens think they’re bees knees and everyone else is lame. It’s a time honored tradition. I think sometimes Juno so frequently plays up how put-together she is that we forget she really isn’t.
The lingo-filled dialogue might have propelled Diablo Cody to a well-deserved Original Screenplay Oscar win, but it’s really the characters that make Juno special. I love how Juno’s layers are pulled back, revealing the self-sure dynamo’s insecurities. Ellen Page deftly lets the emotion peek out, never ever stooping to the melodramatic. Jason Bateman’s Mark and Jennifer Garner’s Vanessa start out looking like one type of couple and shift into something completely different. JK Simmons and Allison Janney as Juno’s father and step-mother are the caring and wise (and witty) parents that movie parents are rarely allowed to be. Read the rest of this entry »
Movie: Born Yesterday
Released: 1950
Stars: Judy Holliday, Broderick Crawford, William Holden
Reason for Watching: Friend’s recommendation
I Can Name This Movie In Three Notes: Broderick Crawford is a rat of a junkyard tycoon who, along with his uber-ditzy live-in girlfriend (Judy Holliday), sets up in Washington, D.C. to grease the palms of a corrupt congressman. Crawford wants Holliday to be presentable, and so hires the intellectual William Holden to give her some learning. But be careful what you wish for!
You Should See This Movie Because: Befitting this blog, the movie was nominated for five Oscars: Costume Design, Director, Picture, Screenplay, plus Judy Holliday won for Best Actress. Holliday’s performance really is out of this world, and though her voice can only be described as Megan Mullally-like, I fell madly in love with it by the end of the film.
The gin rummy scene is easily in my top 50 movie scenes of all time. Any description of it couldn’t do justice, but it blew me away. One of the few times I can remember thinking “Wow, this is an incredible scene” while the scene is still going on. Of course, now I’ve ruined it for all of you. And yes, I did like it more than the gin rummy scene from Goldfinger.
The characters were surprisingly deep for what is essentially a morality play. Broderick Crawford may be the embodiment of the rich a$$hole, ordering people around willy-nilly, using his money to subvert the law, and ending every single sentence with an exclamation mark. But though he pushes Judy Holliday around (both literally and figuratively), his sensitive side can’t help but push through. The treatment of domestic violence and female empowerment were unexpectedly modern.
Ultimately, the movie features a crisp, funny, and at times poignant script rounded out by stellar acting all around.
And the shots of DC in 1950 were pretty cool. Oh, and there’s a Rabbit Maranville reference.
You Shouldn’t See This Movie Because: The tacked-on feel of scenes where Holden and Holliday are gallivanting around DC mean the adaptation from successful Broadway play to movie could have been executed a little better.
Holden’s Jimmy Stewart-like naivete/belief in America is charming, at first. But some statements, such as the one about how rare it was to find a Congressman who could be bought might provide a little too much unintentional comedy.
The ridiculous way couples in older movies kiss: The man grabs the woman firms by the shoulders, then they do a modified bearhug while smushing their lips together. OK, maybe that just bothers me.
The Grouches have plowed their way through all of the films nominated for the big eight awards. Now we make the case for which film or performance we WANT to win. Doesn’t mean we think it will win or even have a shot at winning. But if we had a vote on the nominees, here’s who we would pick, and why:
BEST ACTRESS NOMINEES: Cate Blanchett (Elizabeth: The Golden Age), Julie Christie (Away from Her), Marion Cotillard (La Vie En Rose), Laura Linney (The Savages), Ellen Page (Juno)
The post title is a question Laura Linney’s Wendy Savage asks someone who read her play. A similar question can be asked about The Savages. Yes, it is a bunch of middle class whining, but it isn’t just that. It’s a comment on modern, distant families. It’s a look at the class of the medicated, over-educated, and self-involved. And it’s absolutely terrific.
Of course that shouldn’t be surprising since it starts Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman, two of the best actors in the business today. They play self-absorbed siblings Wendy and Jon who live in New York City and Buffalo, respectively. Both are struggling with their art: she on a semi-autobiographical play and he on a book about playwright Bertolt Brecht. Their distant lives are reunited when their father’s health begins to decline at a retirement community in Arizona. From there they must work together to get him back east and secure him the care he needs.
The magic of The Savages comes through the characters, who are realistic and complex but quite flawed. Jon is a pretty selfish guy who slogs away at his book and teaching theater of the absurd but won’t marry his long-time girlfriend to prevent her from being deported. Wendy is needy for attention, which manifests itself in lying and outbursts of emotion, and is in a relationship with a married man. Both are prone to easing their distress pharmaceutically and both feel stuck in their lives. But these aren’t the type of lost characters-of-a-certain-age we’re used to seeing in the movies. They don’t fit into easy types and they certainly don’t stare out windows forlornly.
So we have these interesting, flawed characters and put them into a heart-wrenching plot. They struggle with what to do with their father as he slides into dementia: they fight each other, they fight the guilt of sending him away, and they fight their demons over helping a man who was rarely a positive influence in their lives. And they also fight because they are very competitive, selfish, stubborn siblings who are in the same general academic field. The film, more than anything, centers on their relationship and it’s one I found to ring very true. They absolutely love each other but their interactions are often combative and both are quick to fling a barb at the other. Read the rest of this entry »
By now you’ve heard how Away From Her is classic Oscar bait: mental illness, old people, former Oscar winners, old people having sex. Which is fine, Oscar may be silly for only considering a small subset of movies, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that subset is silly. And indeed, Away From Her is a perfectly decent movie. But, I found it surprisingly emotionless. I think that’s why Gordon Pinsent touched off some discussion here. For the most part, his is the only character allowed to show emotion. Even then, there are very few scenes where we get to see anything other than him refusing to accept the inevitable, resigned frustration, and resigned acceptance. Brian remarks that since we didn’t really get to see Grant and Fiona before Fiona’s slide, we can’t really be emotionally invested in them. I’d agree with the lack of emotional investment, but I’d argue that director and screenwriter Sarah Polley had more options at her disposal than only showing earlier parts of their relationship. It is therefore somewhat interesting to watch the events of the movie, but hard to “care” about them, in the sense of caring about the characters. Anecdotal evidence (a phrase that generally translates to: “I’m too lazy to do actual research, but this sounds plausible”) suggests that adapting a movie from a short story can lead to poorly fleshed out, too-sparse movies.
I pulled double duty on this one. I felt obligated, writing for a site that every week gets dozens of readers people searching for Outkast lyrics and misspellings of Edith Piaf, to give Elizabeth: The Golden Age due process by first watching its predecessor, Elizabeth.
What a long and baffling prospect that turned out to be. Elizabeth is unfocused, cluttered, and confusing. The Golden Age is a bit tighter but then adds in heaps of silliness. There’s a love triangle! And a rousing speech to the troops in full armor! And a convenient war hero swinging from a mast! And cat fights! And playful but pointed ruminations about love! My eyes hurt from rolling so much.
I probably went into these films at a disadvantage since I haven’t paid any attention to the era since European History in 10th grade, but frankly I should have been able to decipher a bit more. There’s plenty of room for offering tidbits to the Tudor-obsessed, but not by forsaking those of us with barely a passing knowledge. There are too many characters to get to know many of them so all their political and religious motivations get glossed over. The result is their actions often don’t feel justified or well-developed. Read the rest of this entry »
Well, this is the Golden Grouches, so I guess it’s about time that I got grouchy. I went in with low expectations, and they were basically met. Away from Her was a boring drama with no real plot; it lacked tension, exposition, and in general…anything interesting. To top it off, Julie Christie’s role wasn’t even the leading part. The film was about Grant Anderson, played by Gordon “One Look” Pinsent, and how he coped with watching his wife fall apart.
For a change, I won’t write much about Away From Her, and that’s mostly because it was so uninteresting. The only scenes that had any buzz to them were when Olympia Dukakis, in a well-done bitch role, and Pinsent played off each other. Otherwise, I was bored silly. Like Adam said, the play-by-play patient in the nursing home was the only time I even cracked a smile during the film. Read the rest of this entry »
I wouldn’t usually consider myself a fan of musicals. Some I like, some I don’t, but there’s no special affection. Hairspray had me hooked from its first infectious beat. That great opening scene where Tracy walks to school, singing the praises of her city completely drew me in. From there it was a non-stop 2 hour love affair.
Hairspray is just infused with such exuberance and positive energy that it’s impossible to keep the smile off your face. It’s the epitome of a feel-good movie but it’s not schmaltzy or cheesy: it earns its goodwill. It has a simple but well-executed message of tolerance and following your dreams and that music and dancing is toe-tapping and dazzling.
The performances are pretty good and where lacking at least the actors really threw themselves into their roles. John Travolta picked up a Golden Globe Supporting Actor nod, but I didn’t think he was that strong. I did very much appreciate how much fun he had in his cross-dressing role- there was no holding back there. The Baltimore accent sort of faded in and out but I just about fell out of my chair laughing when his first line was, “Would you keep that racket down? I’m tryin to arn in here!” Nikki Blonsky also got the Globes love though again I only found her decent. I’m certainly hoping to see her in more films in the future though. Read the rest of this entry »
So as the fourth and last to post on the movie, there’s not much I can add to the discussion. But as my title should indicate, I join Adam and Jared in my distaste and ambivalence for La Vie en Rose.
I guess it was a bad sign when I fell asleep for about 10 minutes in the first hour of the film, sometime during Gerard Depardieu’s cameo in the film as Piaf’s first manager. It was probably an even worse sign when I woke up, asked Jared if I missed anything, and he said, “No, not really.” Like all of us other than Jared, I knew nothing about Piaf’s life, but I think that the poor editing job hindered anyone’s ability to get a good handle on her life.
In watching all the Oscar contenders, two things seem near inevitable. I will see movies that look terribly unappealing, and which I never would have seen otherwise, and be very pleasantly surprised. And I will see movies that are truly awful, a blight on the film industry. This year, La Vie En Rose is the first movie I’ve seen that falls into the latter. Unless you feel like being bored for two hours, I’d recommend to stay away at all possible. I’m totally with Adam. It seems like they filmed the movie chronologically, realized it was terrible, then cut the movie into 5-10 minutes pieces, and pasted together near-randomly, hoping the result would be seen as artsy. Unfortunately, the movie just stayed terrible. In the interest of full disclosure, I seem to be the only Grouch who was familiar with Edith Piaf’s music beforehand. And not just for its role in Sabrina (yes, both of them).
Read the rest of this entry »
The Savages falls squarely into the second tier of the list of my favorite movies from 2007. I disclose this fact just because I need to rag on the movie a bit. You see, The Savages really should have made its way into the top tier. So, in a sense, it is a disappointment.
Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman are great, as usual. My thoughts on acting aside, if you have a character-driven movie about middle-aged people, I have to imagine these two will be at the top of your wish list. It almost isn’t even noteworthy at this point to remark on their performances. I won’t be heartbroken if Philip Seymour Hoffman doesn’t get a nomination this year, for two reasons. First, having won so recently for Capote, the Academy is reluctant to give him another nod so soon, by their warped, if relatively consistent, logic. Second, while PHS’s three performances this year may combined be worthy of a nod, there isn’t one that absolutely cries out for a nomination.
Read the rest of this entry »
With all the awards and nominations rolling in, the Grouches decided to look at the 8 big categories, predict who we think will win the Oscar, and jibber jabber a bit about the nominees. Next up is Best Actress.
Our picks:
John: Julie Christie
Brian: Ellen Page
Adam: Ellen Page
Jared: Julie Christie
Some disagreement here. Read the rest of this entry »
I should clarify that, despite this post’s title, I enjoyed Waitress. It’s a cute film with a lot of sweetness and some funny moments. But it reminded me a lot of Juno - and not just because they’re both about accidental pregnancies - but the comparison is not favorable. Both are very quirky with a lot of clever, pithy dialogue. The characters are somewhat idiosyncratic and both films use cute gimmicks (the track team in Juno, Jenna’s pie fantasies in Waitress). With so much quirkiness, a film must walk a tight line to avoid becoming too enamored with its own cleverness. Juno absolutely nails it; Waitress does not. And it’s hard to explain why. I guess in Juno there’s a sincerity in the way Ellen Page and her cohorts deliver their lines, even the most hipster and ironic lines. There’s a depth to the characters that’s subtle. In Waitress the actors seem like vessels for self-consciously clever dialogue.
Read the rest of this entry »
Well, mostly for the worse, Enchanted is precisely what you would have expected from a PG-Rated (Could have been G) Disney movie that wasn’t produced by Pixar. Throw in some crass commercialism and a predictable plot, and you have a relatively bad film. No real reason to waste anyone’s time explaining any more about that, especially since it’s not as if we’re the target audience.
But Amy Adams was nominated for a Golden Globe, and has some buzz surrounding her for a possible Oscar nod. She does bring charm and pluck to the role as Giselle and embodies the cartoon-in-the-real-world rather well. But…I just can’t seem to get all that worked up over her performance.
To her credit, Adams made Enchanted remotely watchable. With a lesser actress, maybe the film is unbearable…but I can’t see that distinction making her worthy of a nomination.
This was a great movie. I had no idea what to expect going in, but I came out thoroughly enjoying this film. Brian actually had the same sentiment as I did leaving the theater, namely, for what it set out to accomplish it was nearly flawless in its execution. In fact, Brian does a very good job in his review of the piece, so I’ll just jot down a couple of things I also noted during the movie. (Note to self: In future, pick people you disagree with more when writing a blog. Agreeing with people is much less satisfying than criticizing them.)
Best movie of the year. Period. Granted, this statement is made without seeing every movie (or even every movie up for Best Picture) but I feel pretty confident. It would take quite a feat of film making to make me recant. In fact, in our little behind-the-scenes ranking, I gave Juno a perfect 10 – and I stand by that grade. As a testament to this movie’s prowess, I went into the theater with very high expectations (which you should never do) and not only were they met, they were exceeded. So, you might as well prepare yourself because if you plan on reading any further, the rest of this post will exclusively deal with how awesome this movie is.
As I was telling someone, a film like A Mighty Heart is a tremendous benefit of an endeavor like ours. I most likely would never have seen the movie if not for our shebang, and while I didn’t like it quite as much as Brian or John, it is definitely an above average movie.
As a general rule, I don’t like documentaries, so it is perhaps surprising that I liked A Mighty Heart at all. But as with United 93 (which Brian touched on in his post), I found the film incredibly taut, for the most part. I thought the movie started sagging a bit over the last quarter or so. Also, it isn’t as big a deal, but that little child they kept showing creeped the heck out of me. Not that I don’t understand some reasons she was in there, but I thought the movie would have been better off without her.
I still need to see most of the films being discussed in the Best Actress race, so I can’t really speak yet to whether I think Angelina Jolie should be nominated. But I agree with John and Brian that she gives a very fine performance. And for her to justifiably not receive a nomination, it would probably take a very strong year for actresses, if not an extraordinary one, I feel.
To be blunt, I really liked this movie. For what it aimed to accomplish, The Savages was close to flawless in its execution. Everything from the writing, the acting, the tone, the camera work, hit the right note, which is somewhat ironic as the music choices were at times bizarre, and thus the only minor criticism I’d make. As two siblings forced to deal with their father’s rapid downward spiral towards death, Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman are so genuine in their conflicted emotions and seem so true to real life.
I have to admit, I was pleasantly surprised by this movie (which also brings up the point: Always go into movies with low expectations.). It had a decent plot that moved along while “moving” the audience; the performances by the main characters were, in my opinion, terrific; and the supporting pieces of the movie (scenery, music, supporting cast) along with the camera work were very well done. All-in-all a good, solid movie (not Best Picture quality, but good).
Atonement pivots around a letter that should never have been written, and I wouldn’t go nearly as far as saying that this movie shouldn’t have been made, but its existence seemed rather irrelevant. Having not read the Ian McEwan novel, I still felt the distinct sense that I was watching a film adaption of a very lyrical novel. Apart from one sequence, which I’ll get into later, I never felt invested in the movie; it lacked the epic qualities I’d expect of a period piece. Not all great stories make great movies, and Atonement is no exception. Read the rest of this entry »
So with yesterday’s killing of Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, I was inspired to jot down my thoughts on A Mighty Heart, a film about another episode in the all-too-recent history of terrorism in Pakistan. It would be an understatement to say that I was shocked by how much I liked this movie. After opening to generally positive views, but amidst the clutter of the summer blockbusters, I probably would never have even considered seeing A Mighty Heart had it not been for the Golden Grouches endeavor. But I’ll blame the advertising campaign from Paramount, which as I recall, pushed the film more as an Angelina Jolie drama about lost love than a taut docudrama about the fight against terrorism.
Read the rest of this entry »
I really liked A Mighty Heart for what it was, but I sort of think what it was (and what I liked it for) was not the intent. It is a thrilling and engrossing procedural but comes off strangely clinical. For a movie that was meant to showcase Angelina Jolie there’s a surprising lack of emotion.
The story of reporter Daniel Pearl’s kidnapping and execution in Karachi, Pakistan is well known by now. His widow, Mariane, has become an international symbol of love, strength, and tolerance. The film spends little time setting up the relationship; they are saying their final goodbye about 5 minutes in. Much of their love is shown through flashbacks. If there’s one thing that ruins more movies for me than anything else it’s unbelievable relationships. This film goes about halfway in that their relationship is totally believable, but not very well founded so that we don’t have much of an emotional connection to it.
Much of the film follows the hunt for Danny: tracking down leads, tracing IP addresses, interrogating suspects, etc… All this is very good. Despite knowing how the search would end up I was completely engrossed. Mariane plays a surprisingly small role in the middle third of the film. Read the rest of this entry »
Chuck Klosterman once wrote something along the lines of: “It is much harder to explain why you liked something than to explain why you didn’t like something.” And I’m finding that to ring true as I’m going through the Oscar movies and not only trying to pick out my favorites, but explain why they are the best of the bunch. Juno will end up being one of my favorite movies of the year, if not my most favorite. And I’ll try (and probably fail) to express why that is. But perhaps the simplest thing I can say is that of all the 2007 movies I’ve seen so far, Juno is the only one I’ve felt comfortable and confident recommending, no matter the person asking for the recommendation. Read the rest of this entry »
The post title is the name of Edith Piaf’s biggest hit. It means “No, I regret nothing” and if she truly regretted nothing in her life she wasn’t paying close enough attention.
I, however, do not regret seeing this film. Adam thought this was a great performance buried in a bad film. I’m a little more charitable in that I think it’s a great performance in the middle of a flawed but still decent film.
First thing’s first, Marion Cotillard is terrific. This is one of those full-bodied, larger than life, meaty roles and she really throws herself into it. Piaf is something of a tragic figure in that her own flaws inevitably bring her down, but she’s not very sympathetic. The role requires Cotillard to play a mean drunk probably 50% of the film. Piaf is a self-centered, addiction-prone, and just generally mean character but she’s a hell of a performer. Substance abuse, arthritis, and a series of injuries ages her beyond her years so that she looks elderly in her late 40’s (and even then she manages to bark at her nurses). Cotillard plays all but the young child versions of Piaf, from the brazen street singer around 20 who gets her big break, to the top of the French pop scene, and back down to infirmity. She nails it. Even though I understand she does not do her own singing she still knocks the performance scenes out of the park. Piaf was a dynamo under 5 feet and could spellbind an audience of thousands and Cotillard brings that all to the screen. Read the rest of this entry »
What can I say? Outkast’s line from it’s aptly named Roses described this movie perfectly. (Hey, if Jared is allowed to reference romcoms, I think I should be able to work in a little HotLanta Hip-Hop.) But I digress – already. I recently had a chance/was forced to watch the Edith Pilaf biopic “La Vie En Rose”. I think it’s only fair to first comment that before I watched the movie, I had no idea who Edith Pilaf was, nor what kind of songs she sang. I think that the movie might have struck me slightly differently had I been more informed. That being said, on to the bashing…I mean…critique…
Away From Her seemed to be the Little Critical Darling That Could from this summer. It centers around Grant (Gordon Pinsent) and Fiona (Julie Christie), a long-married couple in Canada. She is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and they struggle with the decision to put her in a nursing home. When she does eventually enter, the home’s rules prevent Grant from visiting for the first month while Fiona settles in. When he does visit, she is distant towards and had made friends - or more? - with another resident. Even more than a film about Alzheimer’s this is a film about marriage. It’s revealed that their marriage has not always been smooth and Grant feels like he may be paying for past transgressions when Fiona slips away from him.
Away From Her is about 40% great. The first part is tremendous. Fiona has more and more episodes and Grant anguishes letting her leave to go to the home. Their love and pain is incredibly moving.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t keep it up. Read the rest of this entry »
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