The Big Chill

DVD review from The Movie Snob.

The Big Chill  (B).  I finally saw this Oscar©-nominated film from 1983 for the first time, and it was certainly an interesting experience.  The first thing that hit me is how impossibly young Glenn Close (5 to 7), Kevin Kline (My Old Lady), William Hurt (The Village), and Jeff Goldblum (Nashville) look!  Anyhoo, this is a talky dramedy about eight Baby Boomers who went to the University of Michigan together in the late 60’s and apparently fancied themselves a bunch of anti-capitalist rebels.  Now in their mid-30s, they come back together because one of the eight has inexplicably committed suicide.  The funeral scene takes up a good chunk of the beginning, and the rest of the movie is a languid saunter through the following weekend as the remaining seven reconnect, pick at old wounds, drink and do some drugs, talk about past infidelities and contemplate new ones, and generally wonder if they’ve sold out their youthful ideals.  Spoiler:  Most of them have, but they’re too self-absorbed to enjoy their general good fortune in life.  Perhaps many of us would agree with an observation by the deceased’s noticeably younger girlfriend Chloe (Meg Tilly, Bullets over Broadway), who also hangs around for the weekend and provides an outsider’s perspective: “I don’t enjoy talking about my past as much as you guys do.”  Still, I enjoyed it well enough.  Although I have the fancy 3-disc Criterion edition, I haven’t watched any of the extras.  Do I really need more navel-gazing from these people?

Thor: Ragnarok

New from the desk of The Movie Snob.

Thor: Ragnarok  (B-).  Of the making of comic-book movies, there is no end.  But, if you’ve got a couple of hours to kill, you could do worse than seeing the third movie focused on second-tier Marvel hero Thor of Asgard (Chris Hemsworth, Snow White and the Huntsman).  The story is the usual fare—a rising supervillain threatens massive destruction unless the heroic guy and his sidekicks can somehow save the day.  And the fight scenes, spaceships, and explosions are also the usual dull, video-game-looking affairs.

So what’s to like?  In a nutshell, it’s the comedy.  I laughed out loud more times during this movie than in any number of straight-up “comedies” I could name.  Fanboys may not appreciate the meta-jokes that poke fun at the silliness of the whole enterprise (like an offhanded joke about Loki’s goofy headgear), but I laughed every time.  Weaselly Loki (Tom Hiddleston, Kong: Skull Island) is back and always fun to watch.  Jeff Goldblum (The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou) is a hoot as the flamboyant impresario of a planet that looks like a giant garbage dump.  As the villainous Hela, Cate Blanchett—a two-time Oscar®-winning actress for Blue Jasmine and The Aviator, don’t you know—chews the CGI with a vengeance and sprouts some mighty impressive antlers whenever she gets ready to kill a bunch of people.  Plus there are fun cameos to watch for, and some other Avengers put in small or not-so-small appearances.  This movie was directed by Taika Waititi, a New Zealander who also directed and starred in the vampire comedy What We Do in the Shadows.  This movie was even funnier.

The Grand Budapest Hotel

A new movie review from The Movie Snob.

The Grand Budapest Hotel  (B).  I hardly know what grade to give the latest movie from writer-director Wes Anderson.  He is known (to me, anyway), as director of whimsical movies, some of which I have liked (Moonrise Kingdom, Fantastic Mr. Fox) and some of which I haven’t (The Royal Tenenbaums, Bottle Rocket).  The Grand Budapest Hotel is a very watchable film, with a madcap story that barely pauses to let you catch your breath.  Although the movie is imaginative and occasionally amusing, it is so suffused with nostalgia and deeply felt loss that I left feeling pretty sad.  The cast is a who’s who of working actors, but Ralph Fiennes (Wrath of the Titans) is the star and really steals the show.  He plays M. Gustave, a concierge at a fabulous resort hotel somewhere in eastern Europe just before World War II.  He takes a young refugee (from the Middle East, I think?) under his wing as the hotel’s new lobby boy, and the two have quite a series of adventures.  Among the many familiar faces who turn up are the lovely Saoirse Ronan (The Host), F. Murray Abraham (Amadeus), Jeff Goldblum (Nashville), Jude Law (Side Effects), and Edward Norton (Fight Club).  If you like Wes Anderson, I think you will almost certainly like this movie.  But don’t go expecting a straight comedy.

Nashville (the movie, not the TV show)

The Movie Snob checks out a classic.

Nashville  (B).  A local theater is continuing to show some older movies on Tuesday nights, so I took advantage of the opportunity to see this famous 1975 Robert Altman film on the big screen.  It’s kind of a weird, shambling movie.  Basically it takes a big cast of characters that are all in Nashville, and it follows them around as they come together and disconnect in various ways over the course of several days.  One unifying thread to the movie is a political campaign in full swing.  An upstart third-party presidential candidate (who is heard but never seen) is campaigning relentlessly in Nashville on ideas like taxing churches, changing the national anthem, and excluding lawyers from Congress.  One of his sleazy political operatives, well-played by Michael Murphy (Manhattan), is trying to recruit some country singers to perform at a rally.  A fragile queen of country music (Ronee Blakley, A Nightmare on Elm Street) is trying to get her feet back under her after recovering from a serious injury.  A music trio grapples with the fact that it is also a love triangle.  A ditzy BBC journalist (Geraldine Chaplin, Doctor Zhivago) wanders around interviewing anybody unlucky enough to stray into her orbit.  Lily Tomlin (A Prairie Home Companion) is a gospel singer.  Jeff Goldblum (The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou) drives a massive chopper around, wears big glasses, and gets called “Tricycle Man” in the credits.  There’s lots of country music, mostly pretty cheesy.  And there is much, much more in this 2 hour and 40 minute slice of 1970s Americana.  Although IMDB calls it a drama, it has quite a few funny moments.  In short, I got a kick out of it.

Morning Glory

The premiere review for new Movie Court member Dan in Reel Life

This just in: Stay away from Morning Glory. Seeking a respite from the chill of Winter’s Bone, and from the, well, grittiness of True Grit, my girlfriend and I sought shelter at the “dollar” theater ($2 on Saturday nights) for what we hoped would be fun, light-hearted fare. We left the theater laughing alright, but not for the reasons the film intended. The ridiculous premises and clichéd dialogue left us second-guessing ourselves for not walking out halfway through.

The film chronicles the efforts of its heroine, Becky Fuller (Rachel McAdams, The Family Stone) in turning around a struggling morning network TV show. In the process she battles an executive (Jeff Goldblum, The Big Chill) who clearly expects her to fail and yet harasses her for her poor performance, a preexisting unmanageable anchor she promptly fires, a mother who abdicates her parental duty to support her daughter with absurd one-dimensional cruelty (“your (deceased) father was wrong to encourage your dreams” she tells Becky), and an incompetent yet quirky staff accustomed to failure. But her biggest hurdle and the crux of the film’s tension is gaining the cooperation of the legendary but disgraced anchor Mike Pomeroy (Harrison Ford, Star Wars). Becky has forced him out of retirement due to an obscure clause in his contract that will deny him severance if he refuses the job. Ironically it would seem the producers of this film coerced Ford to take the part in this stinker by some similar ruse.

It’s tough to fault the actors for the mess that is this film because the screenplay could have been written by Michael Scott. Also, Diane Keaton (Annie Hall) was in the movie. The less said about this, the better.

Grade: D-

 

Annie Hall

DVD review from The Movie Snob

Annie Hall (C). I am trying to actually watch some of the DVDs that I have bought over the years and never gotten around to watching. I saw this movie once in college and didn’t remember it at all. On this second viewing, 20 years later, I am chagrined that this movie beat Star Wars for the 1977 best-picture Oscar. Although the movie is, I suppose, a romantic comedy, it is neither romantic nor funny. Woody Allen (Match Point) plays a neurotic New York comedian named Alvy Singer, and Diane Keaton (Baby Boom) plays the title character, a ditzy gal who’s apparently an aspiring singer. Perhaps the problem is that Annie is lovable but Alvy is not. He’s pretty much thoroughly unpleasant, and you don’t really want Annie to be with him. Tons of brief star appearances add some interest, such as Christopher Walken (Hairspray) as Annie’s brother and Jeff Goldblum (Jurassic Park) as a random guy at a lavish Hollywood party. I was surprised in the credits to see Sigourney Weaver (Aliens) listed as “Alvy’s date” in one of the last scenes in the movie, so I rewound, and although the people are too small to be recognizable, she is clearly towering over the diminutive Allen. And according to IMDB, Truman Capote has an uncredited cameo as a guy Alvy refers to as a “Truman Capote look-alike.” Not particularly great. Or good.

The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou

From the desk of The Movie Snob:

The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou (C+). This is a very odd comedy from the same creative folks behind Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums. And I’ll say up front that I really disliked Tenenbaums. But I decided to give The Life Aquatic a chance for a couple of reasons: (1) the previews made it look like a kinder, gentler movie than its immediate predecessor, and (2) I’ve always had a soft spot in my heart for Jacques Cousteau, the obvious inspiration for the character of Steve Zissou (Bill Murray, City of Ember). At the beginning, the movie sets up two tidy little plots with a lot of comic potential: (1) Zissou has decided to embark on an Ahab-like quest to kill the mysterious beast, a “jaguar shark,” that ate his best friend, and (2) Zissou meets his adult son Ned (Owen Wilson, The Internship) for the first time and impulsively invites him to join his crew aboard the Belafonte. So I was expecting the movie to be one part action flick, one part father-son-bonding flick. And I guess it sort of was, but after the set-up the plot just kind of wanders around from one tangent to another, leaving the two main threads dangling for so long that you begin wonder if the movie will ever find its way back. Anyhoo, it’s not a bad movie if you don’t mind the lack of narrative momentum. There are some decent laughs, and the movie boasts a good cast including Angelica Huston (50/50), Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine), Jeff Goldblum (Annie Hall), and Willem Dafoe (American Dreamz).

Igby Goes Down

Elder Statesman John adds his commentary on Igby Goes Down:

Watched Igby last night. I agree with David. It was a well-written, superbly acted dark comedy. I thought Kieran Culkin (Scott Pilgrim vs. the World) was excellent–and the F-bombs were scripted and shouldn’t affect his performance evaluation (I actually didn’t feel they were excessive). I thought Jeff Goldblum (Thor: Ragnarok) and Susan Sarandon (Solitary Man) were excellent. The movie is a more realistic, hence more sobering, example of true dysfunction in the upper crust east coast society. Kind of a combination Catcher in the Rye, Royal Tenenbaums and Great Gatsby. Not a pick-me-up. The Movie Snob probably, and Angie definitely, would not like it. Grade: A-

Igby Goes Down

This Guy Named David invited himself to join The Movie Court, so we let him. Here’s a review from him.

Igby Goes Down

Grade- B+

It’s hard to get a real feel for this movie, but it’s definitely worth the rent. Super dark comedy that, throughout, shifts from humor to sadness to depth to tragedy and back to humor. Not predictable (which is a welcome relief). Great cast. Kieran Culkin (The Cider House Rules) plays Igby and is not bad (except for the dropping of blatantly unnecessary f-bombs at random times during sentences). Susan Sarandon (Dead Man Walking) is a dysfunctional mom. Claire Danes (Shopgirl) plays the only “normal” character. Amanda Peet (who I have admired since getting naked in The Whole Nine Yards) plays the failed NY dancer, and is impressive (in her acting this time). Ryan Phillippe (Letters to Juliet) is Igby’s despised, “successful” older brother and is very good. Jeff Goldblum (The Big Chill) is the wealthy godfather of Igby and is annoying, as usual. Bill Pullman (Phoebe in Wonderland) plays the schizophrenic father, but doesn’t have a huge role. One review I saw last week called this movie “a spoiled, rich kid living out Catcher in the Rye.” If you liked the book, you’ll probably really like the movie. If it hadn’t dragged a little, it would have been an A.