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20Nov

Reviews in Short: November 2015

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Miss Meadows

One odd duck of a movie, part quirky black comedy, part vigilante crime drama. There’s a fine line between lovably eccentric and flat-out annoying, and Katie Holmes can’t quite pull off the former as a troubled schoolteacher who divides her time between correcting strangers’ grammar and mowing down neighborhood thugs. Not sure who thought that mixing this tap-dancing, pistol-packing Mary Poppins with creepy sex offenders was a good idea, but I couldn’t wait for the end credits so I could say “toodle-oo.” Release: 2014 Grade: D+

*****

John Wick

A retired hit man (Keanu Reeves) goes ballistic when gangsters snuff out his mutt and steal his car in this mindless shoot-‘em-up for people who are too lazy to play video games. Clunky dialogue and an impressive waste of acting talent (Willem Dafoe, Ian McShane, Michael Nyqvist) also distinguish this mind-numbing waste of time. Hey, I don’t like it when they kill the dog, either, but this is ridiculous. Release: 2014 Grade: F

*****

Black Sea

Jude Law plays a recently fired salvage skipper who leads a band of miscreants on a risky mission to steal gold bars from a Nazi submarine resting on the bottom of the Black Sea. It’s a decent little thriller, and proof that you don’t need a big budget to make an exciting action movie – just some good performances and a script that isn’t too far-fetched. Release: 2015 Grade: B

18Nov

Horrible Reviews

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Hi kids! See the picture of the man? He is a very funny man. He is from a country called the Netherlands.

The man watches movies. He watches movies that have lots of poop and pee and boobies and bad words. The man watches those naughty movies so that you don’t have to …

Actually, I don’t know the man’s name – let’s call him “Dutch.” Dutch is one amusing dude. He is the brains behind a YouTube channel called “Horrible Reviews,” which will never be confused with Siskel and Ebert. Unlike so many film critics, there is nothing superior or “know-it-all” about Dutch. With a shrug or a dazed expression, he often admits that he has no idea what the day’s movie is supposed to be about. Metaphors and symbolism? Who cares? The question for Dutch is: Is the movie disturbing – in a good way?

Dutch is much like the doofus who could be sitting next to you on the sofa, struggling for meaning after having just endured The Human Centipede 3 (Final Sequence). He is the college roommate who stops his constant movie-watching only to fetch more beer from the refrigerator. Dutch reviews nasty stuff like A Serbian Film from what appears to be a couch in his parents’ basement.

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Gap-toothed, stubble-chinned Dutch (I tried to unearth his real name, but he apparently guards it carefully) adheres to a standard format in his “disturbing films” series; each video – there are at least 18 of them now – is less than 15 minutes in length. Dutch sits on his sofa behind his coffee table, bottle of beer or vodka at hand, and watches five infamous movies, the kind of flicks that Ebert might call “vile” but that attract, often inexplicably, a rabid following (see partial list, above).

In a related video, Dutch explained his work routine: “Chunks of the reviews are often already more or less written in my head while taking showers. You know how that goes.”

Dutch is more intelligent than his beer-guzzling, sofa-hugging image implies. With his broken English and profanity-laced voiceovers, he might not be the most eloquent of film critics, but he knows an entertaining flick when he sees one. He knows, for example, the difference between a truly “disturbing” film and one that is merely “disgusting” (think bodily fluids). And if the day’s selection is a bore, he’ll tell you so.

Dutch is Joe Bob Briggs – remember him? – for the Internet age, but funnier. His channel has 95,000 subscribers and more than 16 million views. You might take a pass on his recommendations, but I’m guessing you’ll give Dutch himself a thumbs up.

Click here for “The Most Disturbing Movies Ever”

14Nov

The Weekly Review: November 8 – 14

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Bunker Hillary

World War III: Seems obvious that the best man for the job is Hillary.

*****

I’m so glad that my college years are a distant memory. Don’t think I could stomach going into permanent debt for the privilege of spending four long years in the midst of so many entitled brats.

*****

Who the fuck is this asshole Julian Castro? Apparently, the obnoxious little shit believes that he’s my daddy – yours, too, if you smoke.

*****

Something bad happened in Paris, but apparently the world doesn’t require The Grouchy Editor’s input. One or two other media outlets seem to be covering the story.

11Nov

The Martian

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Normally, I’m a sucker for castaway movies, and I’m also a fan of space-travel adventures. That should land me squarely in the target audience for The Martian, especially since I loved the book it’s based on. But my reaction to Ridley Scott’s big-budget science-fiction thriller was … well, it was OK. I guess.

Matt Damon, presumably cast as an astronaut accidentally stranded on Mars because Tom Hanks was too old to play the part, gives an engaging performance. The scenery and special effects are suitably Mars-like. And the screenplay is certainly faithful to Andy Weir’s novel. But my overall impression of the film is lukewarm. Maybe director Scott (Alien, Blade Runner) has simply lost his outer-space mojo. Maybe the problem is the story itself, which is too futuristic to conjure the fact-based drama of Apollo 13, yet too “hard science” to deliver goofy good fun like, say, Robinson Crusoe on Mars. Instead, The Martian resides in a science-fiction no-man’s land: too pokey and clinical to generate much suspense, too matter-of-fact to be much fun.

Damon is fine as wise-cracking, marooned Mark Watney, but the mood of his isolation is undermined when the film keeps cutting back to NASA scientists on Earth, who are scrambling to find ways to rescue him. It would be akin to cutting away from Hanks’s lengthy sojourn on his deserted island in Cast Away to scenes of fretting FedEx executives back at mainland headquarters.

Pare back on those NASA scenes — including unnecessary business with big names Jeff Daniels and Kristen Wiig — and you’d have a tighter, more dramatic film. At 2 hours and 15 minutes, the movie is often like Watney’s tenure on Mars: overlong and occasionally tedious. Grade: B

Director: Ridley Scott Cast: Matt Damon, Jessica Chastain, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Jeff Daniels, Kristen Wiig, Michael Pena, Sean Bean, Kate Mara, Sebastian Stan, Aksel Hennie Release: 2015

Watch Trailers and Clips (click here)

07Nov

The Weekly Review: November 1 – 7

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.

Wow. Maybe we should stop picking on these guys and start treating them like the true American heroes that they are. Right?

*****

Looking Good on TV:

Quentin Tarantino on MSNBC. I’m not a big fan of Tarantino’s movies. He annoys me on talk shows. I think his films, although well-crafted, usually have dumb subject matter. But after watching him refuse to back down in the face of public pressure, primarily from police unions, I have more respect for him.

**

Looking Bad on TV:

George Will on Fox News. “You’re a hack!” screamed Bill O’Reilly, angry about a column Will wrote that criticized O’Reilly’s book about Ronald Reagan. Will meekly took the verbal beatdown, looking like a little boy caught pissing in a cookie jar.

06Nov

The Martian

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by Andy Weir

What on Earth is there not to like about this book? It’s a first-time novel from an obscure software programmer who initially gave the thing away as a free e-book, and which is now a bestseller and the basis of a blockbuster movie starring Matt Damon. So kudos to Andy Weir, who transferred his love of all things NASA and Dr. Who into a rip-roaring adventure about an astronaut stranded on Mars.

Did I mention that I loved this book? There are two reasons for that: 1) Our hero, botanist/astronaut Mark Watney, is an engaging smart-ass whose predicament is both harrowing and entertaining; 2) The Martian is what they call a “hard science” novel, in that the events are (mostly) based on real science – no little green men or flying saucers in this story. I confess that at times the extensive math and/or chemistry made my eyes glaze over, but more often Watney’s constant mechanical tinkering was both fascinating and (dare I say it?) educational. His predicament might have been dire, but as a reader, it was great fun to be stuck on the Red Planet with him.

Nitpicks: Apparently, the type of Martian sandstorm that precipitates Watney’s abandonment by fellow astronauts is pure fiction. Also, it’s a stretch to believe that Earthlings would so easily part with millions (billions?) of taxpayer dollars, not to mention risk the lives of five other astronauts, to rescue just one man – not even Matt Damon.

31Oct

The Weekly Review: October 25 – 31

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Grading the Late-night Comics

Jimmy Fallon

What’s Good: His monologues are sharp.

What’s Bad: His guests are all fantastic! Their shows and movies and songs and books are the greatest!

**

Seth Meyers

What’s Good: He’s still doing Saturday Night Live’s “Weekend Update,” and he’s still doing it well.

What’s Bad: I can tolerate only so much of that girlish giggle.

**

Conan O’Brien

What’s Good: His monologues and ad-libs are clever.

What’s Bad: He’s on TBS, so he gets stuck with C-level guests and I tend to forget that he’s on.

**

James Corden

What’s Good: His musical partner, Reggie Watts, is the best of the bunch.

What’s Bad: He has Jimmy Fallon Disease, in that his head goes so far up his guests’ butts that you’re not sure where he’s gone.

**

Trevor Noah

What’s Good: I don’t know because I refuse to watch him.

What’s Bad: He still hasn’t apologized for his Twitter diss of two-thirds of the country (those of us in “Flyover Land”), so I won’t apologize for ignoring his show.

**

Stephen Colbert

What’s Good: He has interesting guests … even some authors!

What’s Bad: I don’t find him the least bit funny.

**

Jimmy Kimmel

What’s Good: He’s middle-of-the-road. Not bad, not great.

What’s Bad: Time to dump that tired Matt Damon bit.

*****

Here’s an unexpected Halloween treat: Starz is premiering Ash vs. Evil Dead today, and it doesn’t suck. In fact, the opening episode is downright entertaining.

As a bonus, for anyone wondering whatever happened to Dana DeLorenzo, frequent dancing partner for Craig Ferguson on his old late-night show (below, not dancing), she has a starring role.

*****

“Sugar”

“Back when I covered that Duke fake rape case, I had to go in a bunch of strip clubs, right? Because I was investigating this stripper. And one of the guys who managed the club told me, ‘I got the name for you, if you ever decide to come into the business.’ So the guy told me that I would be named Sugar.” — Megyn Kelly, explaining what no one asked her to explain.

It might, however, explain a thing or two about Megyn Kelly.

28Oct

The Cuckoo’s Calling

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by Robert Galbraith

I thoroughly enjoyed J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books, but when I did have complaints about them, they were usually related to plot – there was often too much of it. Rowling’s characters were delightful, but her convoluted back stories could be challenging.

Ditto for The Cuckoo’s Calling, an old-fashioned detective yarn that Rowling wrote under the pseudonym “Robert Galbraith.” Cuckoo’s protagonist, a war vet turned private investigator named Cormoran Strike, is interesting and likable, and Rowling’s supporting cast is colorful. But when crucial plot points unfold near the end of the story, my eyes would occasionally glaze over; it feels like over-plotting when it takes the hero an entire chapter to explain how he solved the case.

I might be nitpicking because, as with the Potter books, getting to the end of the story is a lot of fun. The slovenly Strike sleeps on a makeshift bed in his tiny office, drinks too much, and bumps heads with the rich and famous in London as he investigates the apparent suicide of a supermodel. He is aided by a temp worker who becomes his girl Friday and, presumably, his potential love interest. Together, this duo makes Cuckoo a pleasure to read – complex plot be damned.

24Oct

The Weekly Review: October 18 – 24

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TV Update

The so-called Golden Age of Television has spoiled us. Most new and returning series this fall are good, bad, or average – with one great exception.

Two-sentence reviews:

Manhattan – This drama about WWII scientists building the bomb is like physics: brainy, but lacking in soul. Try as I might, I just don’t care about the characters. Grade: C+

Scream Queens – Ryan Murphy sanitizes – barely – Scary Movie for network TV. I really should like this show about terrorized sorority girls more than I do, because I often feel that as a teenage girl trapped in a middle-aged man’s body, I must be in the target demo. Grade: B-

Fargo – So Fargo, so good. It might be the perfect series if they’d just ditch those stereotypical Minnesota accents (you betcha I am biased). Grade: A-

The Last Man on Earth – Gilligan’s Island, but with an actual IQ. Normally, I’m not a big fan of sitcoms, but this one wears well. Grade: B+

The Carbonaro Effect – It’s a hidden-camera show. I am a sucker for hidden-camera shows. Grade: B+

The Last Kingdom – BBC America presents Game of Thrones without the nudity. Who on Earth wants that?

From Britain’s The Independent:

Nice to know that the good folks at The Independent share my aversion to fully-clothed dry humps. Grade: B-

American Horror Story: Hotel – It looks great, but the plot is aimless, recycled horror from the omnipresent Ryan Murphy. The only real suspense comes from guessing how much gratuitous male-model ass Murphy will display in each episode. Grade: C

p.s. Has anyone else noticed that, despite her Oscar for Misery, Kathy Bates can’t act worth a lick?

*****

From The Huffington Post:

I did that, too. And tomorrow, I plan to take my first-ever shower!

22Oct

Philomena

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Ordinarily, if you tell me to check out a movie because it’s “heartwarming,” or “great for the whole family,” I grab my Howard Stern books and run for the hills. I do that because, nine times out of ten (OK, 9.7 times out of 10), that description is code for “sappy and crappy.” But then along comes an exception like Philomena, which is part comedy, part road movie, part tearjerker and yes, “heartwarming and great for the whole family.”

Steve Coogan plays a disgraced BBC journalist who, in an attempt to resuscitate his career, agrees to do a human-interest piece about an elderly woman who, having lost touch with her infant son in the 1950s, hopes to find him again in America.

Martin Sixsmith (Coogan) and Philomena Lee (Judi Dench) travel to Washington, D.C., and their exploits are charming and unpredictable, not cloying or clichéd. If this movie was typical Hollywood fare, we would no doubt get scenes of Philomena learning to twerk, or performing a rap routine. Instead, Philomena gets laughs by defying our expectations with well-timed observations, or with gentle pokes at Sixsmith.

The screenplay, co-written by Coogan and Jeff Pope from a book by the real Sixsmith, time and again takes unexpected turns. When we at last learn what became of Philomena’s beloved son, it caught me off-guard – twice. Without giving away too much of the plot, let’s just say the boy’s adulthood involves Ronald Reagan and personal secrets.

Coogan and Dench are both understated and both very good. If the film has a flaw, it’s that the main villain, once revealed, is perhaps a bit too villainous – or at least this person’s motivations aren’t adequately explained. Grade: A-

Director: Stephen Frears Cast: Judi Dench, Steve Coogan, Sophie Kennedy Clark, Mare Winningham, Barbara Jefford, Ruth McCabe, Peter Hermann, Anna Maxwell Martin, Michelle Fairley Release: 2013

Watch Trailers and Clips (click here)