Fuck You, You Whore

2009 Marlon Welles Awards Nominee:

Best Picture
Best Actor: Joseph Gordon-Levitt's soul crushing performance
Best Original Screenplay: Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber
The Real Deal
Best Line: "This belief stemmed from early exposure to sad British pop music and a total mis-reading of the movie 'The Graduate'. "
Best Montage: Tom gets his life together set to Wolfmother's "Vagabond"
Most Ridiculous Moment: Han Solo winks
Most Innovative Moment: Tie: Putting Tom inside the movies he's watching AND Split screen of Tom's expectations and reality
Best Opening Credits: Baby pictures set to Regina's "Us"
Best Music
Best Use of a Song: Making "You Make My Dreams" relevant again
Best Trailer
Best Use of a Song in the Trailer: Tie: Regina's "Us" AND Wolfmother's "Vagabond"
Best "Best Moment of the Film": Tom and Summer's joy ride through IKEA set to "There Goes the Fear" from the Doves

The Courage of Your Convictions

Julie and Julia

I hate people that pigeonhole a movie into a certain audience. I think there have many such complaints with the release of Julie and Julia recently because people realized that it was actually, you know- a good movie. I went into the theater alone, probably the youngest male inside (mildly surprised at how many people had come to a 4:05 Monday showing) and hightailed it for one of the back rows so nobody could see how embarrassing it was for a teenage male to be sitting alone in a movie classified by mainstream audiences as a "chick flick." True this sort of pigeonholing would ordinarily deter me from seeing such a movie but, damn it, Meryl Streep rocks! And the trailer actually had me excited for the film so fuck it all!

And I liked it (of course). Nora Ephron managed to hold my attention through You've Got Mail so no surprises considering the movie was actually supposed to be good. Meryl Streep is obviously wonderful but I was much more interested in the storyline of Amy Adams' Julie. I know Streep is more entertaining but her storyline lacks a hook for me to grab on. I understand that the drama with her stems from her seemingly futile attempts to get her cookbook published. However, we know that she eventually will since Julie Powell is reading from it in the future. Julie, on the other hand, is stuck in her dead end job, with shallow dead beat friends and finds solace in cooking but also the people that support her blog.

I was very interested in the argument that Julie and her husband have about halfway through the film. She has become completely immersed in her blog and in the emotions of hundreds of people she has never met. Amy Adams plays this moment off subtly but her final admission that she cannot be as good a person as Julia Child is quite riveting and makes you feel rather sympathetic to a character that doesn't charm quite as much as the icon she looks up to. And Chris Messima is supportive and subtle in his best Paul Rudd impersonation. I understand that Streep is remarkable in her role but, from what I have read in reviews, people insist that a movie just about her would have been better. Honestly, two hours of just Julia Child (especially when there doesn't seem to be any real drama with her) would make me go crazy. Her discovery and journey of cooking just isn't as interesting to me as the one Julie Powell takes. Maybe the performances are vastly different in quality but from a plot standpoint, I wanted Julie to succeed and cheered for her when she realized the only Julia Child she needs to worry about is the one in her head.

Grade: B

2009 Marlon Welles Awards Nominee:

Best Actress: Amy Adam's subtly
Best Supporting Actress: Meryl Streep's effusiveness
Best Adapted Screenplay: Nora Ephron and her seemlessly fractured narrative
Best Scene Stealer: Jane Lynch, who I'm convinced should play Big Bird in a biopic

One African Baby and an Ipod

Bruno

What a vexing film. At times outrageously hilarious, other times incessantly grotesque, it is maybe the most hit or miss movie this year. The trailer for Bruno blinded me so much with its hilarity that I forgot about the fact that I didn't like Borat as much as everyone else in the world did. In fact, I much prefer the shortened and varied sketches of Da Ali G show because it seems to restrain Sacha Baron Cohen's insistence on grossing the audience out. This was one of the most anticipated movies for me this summer based solely on that trailer. And it kind of disappointed me. When it made social statements about parental exploitation, gay bashing and the ridiculous talk show phenomenon, Bruno is hilarious and (almost) thought-provoking. However, scenes like the sex party, the tv show panel and the entire final sequence which looked and was pretty much staged by the producers are purely for shock value and do nothing for the progression of the film or social issues.

I found, at times, that the movie was a labor for me. I was waiting for the next scene to happen. I walked out and couldn't believe that it was less than an hour and a half. If Sacha Baron had just stuck to those good scenes, he could have made a good movie. I know for a fact that he had hours of footage to deal with but instead chose to show random people having sex on camera. I really have no complaints about the gay sex scene or the twirling penis on screen. This I think is somewhat necessary shock value. Yes, he's gay. He's not going to be as funny and oblivious as Borat. Bruno knows pretty much what he's doing and loves it. If only the rest of us could.

Grade: B-

2009 Marlon Welles Awards Nominee:

Best Line: "That is such a Samantha thing to say"
Best Comedic Performance: Sacha Baron is still remarkable though
Most Surprising Moment: Penis. On camera.
Best Trailer
Best Use of a Song in the Trailer: "The Barber of Seville"
Best "Best Moment of the Film": The shameless parenting exhibited by the audition parents

Whatever is Written

Whatever Works

I feel like making a lot of puns about how thinly drawn this script is SO, this movie is as thin as:
-Evan Rachel Wood
-Woody Allen's stack of truly crappy movies
-Whatever is left of Larry David's hair
-The window that Boris jumps through
-Boris' willingness to live
-My patience for this movie's credibility

Ok. So this really was not as bad as it could have been. It's a very hit or miss movie. Some of the jokes had me laughing uproariously while others were really stupid. Larry David's asides to the camera were dreadful because it seemed like he was trying to make up for how silly the movie is with his go to line about whatever works (which is a myth, by the way). Be serious. There is no way you can make any overarching statement or theme about this film. It's basically around for cheap laughs.

And that's completely understandable. This was a 30-year-old script that Woody pulled out to beat the writer's strike deadline. I don't think he ever expected this film to be good so he doesn't try too hard to impress us in the movie. It's essentially a fable that takes things a bit too far. The second Patricia Clarkson shows up on screen, caution is thrown to the wind and everything starts falling apart for the movie. Threesomes. Predictable gay bar scenes. Lame attempts at a happy ending. Stupid romances between young people. In fact, when it was just Boris and Melodie married and exploring each other's psyches, I rather liked the movie. Introducing Patricia Clarkson basically transforms the movie from an exploration of marriage and love to a movie about New York's effect on outsiders (which is highly inaccurate I assume). Larry David generally endears himself to me and almost seems relatable until his marriage to Melodie. Evan Rachel Wood's accent didn't annoy me as much as I thought it would. Overall, if you cut out half the movie and change the direction that the couple goes in, I wouldn't have minded the movie.

Grade: C

2009 Marlon Welles Awards Nominee:

Best Comedic Performance: Larry David's misanthrope
Most Ridiculous Moment: So the dad is gay?

Public Frenemies

I found this film fascinating and boring. Riveting and droll. So much of it was contradictory that I could never really get into it. It's a shame that my experience was immediately ruined by the HD look of the film, but it was. I'm used to my gangster movies glamorizing the titular character and portraying him exactly how the audience is supposed to feel about him. Of course, movies today are much more complicated than the rise and fall of Edward G. Robinson in Little Caesar but the look of the film attempted to make it feel contemporary as if these people could be living among us. Michael Mann makes a bold choice here but not one I would make. If you are going to make a movie about the C.I.A. versus the gangsters of yesteryear, make it the ultimate gangster movie about these "enemies." Have the ultimate Heat-like cat and mouse game that you are so well known for. Instead, we get only one real showdown between Bale and Depp (though riveting it may be). The rest of the time we attempt to get insight into the minds of both Purvis and Dillinger as well as the relationship of Dillinger and Billie and come up empty handed.

The beginning especially bored me. After being thrown off by the image I found the first couple of bank robberies underwhelming. Perhaps the lack of suspense in these banks was meant to show how easy it was to be a bank robber back then. Either way, there was no thrill to watching these men rob these banks and then supposedly act like heroes for the rest of the country. Depp is customarily smug in his role and is never asked to stray too far away from what he knows. And I'm glad Bale didn't feel the need to overdo it in a movie that requires little of him as well. No matter what he does, I will always be a Christian Bale fan. Billy Crudup is hilarious as J. Edgar and provided some lift to the movie upon his appearance.

The movie finally shifts into gear towards the middle at which point I realize that I only care for the action sequences in the film. If this is the fault of it being a gangster movie or the fault of the film itself I don't know. The shootout in the forest was awesome as was the climactic moment when Dillinger gets shot. My main fault with the film is the relationship between Dillinger and Billie, which the movie kind of hinged upon. Depp and Cotillard (when I could understand her) had no chemistry and then their relationship is so thinly drawn that when dude goes to visit her in prison after Dillinger dies I contemplated walking out because I didn't care. Everything about this film pushes me away at an emotional level and then tries to pull me back in with the way it looks and is shot. Another contradiction.

Grade: C+

2009 Marlon Welles Awards Nominee:

Best "Best Moment of the Film": Dillinger takes a stroll through the office assigned to him

August

I've always wondered how many movies I watch in a month. Here we go:

August 1
The Last Days
The Wrong Man

August 2
Lolita
Heaven Can Wait

August 3
The Band's Visit
Foreign Correspondent

August 4
Mutiny on the Bounty
The President's Analyst

August 5
(500) Days of Summer
Man Push Cart

August 6
Humpday

August 7
Chop Shop
The Undercover Man

August 8
G.I. Joe

August 9
To Catch a Thief
Office Space

August 10
Julie & Julia

August 11
Goodbye, Solo
The Unforgiven

August 12
None

August 13
The Station Agent
The Bad and the Beautiful
Macao

August 14
District 9
Lilies of the Field

August 15
Helter Skelter
A Raisin in the Sun

August 16
Now, Voyager

August 17
McCabe and Mrs. Miller

August 18
Red Dust
The Gold Rush

August 19
Jackie Brown
In the Loop

August 20
The Heiress

August 21
Inglourious Basterds
All About Eve

August 22
None

August 23
Batman

August 24
Batman Returns

August 25
None

August 26
None

August 27
The Big Knife
While the City Sleeps

August 28
None

August 29
None

August 30
There's Something About Mary

August 31
Kill Bill Vol. 1

Movies to Date: 41