Archive for category: Reviews

This Judd Apatow-Amy Schumer flick featured every cliche in the rom-com book, but hey, it’s a pretty good book! I laughed pretty much the whole way through every silly scene, enjoying the company of all the characters, from Bill Hader and Tilda Swinton to Brie Larson to LeBron James and Chrissie Evert. The reviews I’ve seen have been unduly negative, but 1) I’ve never seen Amy Schumer’s Comedy Central show, so wasn’t comparing the movie to anything and 2) even though the dirty jokes were told by a woman, I wasn’t looking at this as any kind of feminist statement. Nothing was “real,” except in the sense of parody, but this was a far more recognizable world than Spy.

I’m not sure this movie would be of interest or make sense to anyone who hasn’t followed Brian Wilson’s career, but that’s still a pretty big market. And even for those like me who have been fans forever, the movie left some pretty big holes – like how he came under the control of his Svengali, Dr. Eugene Landy, and what happened during all the years it took Paul Dano to become John Cusack. And speaking of Dr. Landy, why do directors keep casting Paul Giamatti in these roles, where instead of the character you just see Paul-Giamatti-in-a-bad-wig? The best bits are in the studio, where the young Wilson crafts his music, and the fake “archival” shots of 1963, the beach and “Fun Fun Fun.” Some truths are stranger than fiction, and this is one of them.

 

There was no need to make Sgt. Troy look like an untrustworthy cad, with a mustache that drooped over his upper lip, supercilious eyes and foppish clothes. We knew, without that, that he nowhere the equal of the telegraphically named Gabriel Oak, but this was typical of the unsubtle approach of director Thomas Vinterberg to the Thomas Hardy novel. The movie itself, however, was not without its period charms, most notably Carey Mulligan’s beautiful, expressive face. I was reminded of Reese Witherspoon and Wild: spending two hours watching Carey Mulligan was never less than pleasant.

 

In this consistently bizarre portrait of the artist, we get no insight into J.M.W.Turner or his art. Instead, we get a character study of Timothy Spall as a grunting, lecherous, antisocial individual who walks as if his legs are stilts protruding from his hips. The movie is a montage of short vignettes, each cut short before its finish, each unrelated to the one that follows. Together they produce an impression – but of what? Actual historical figures are thrown in, as are some of Turner’s famous paintings, but how they came to be there is as much a mystery at the end of the film as its outset.