Movie Review: The Amateurs (The Moguls) (2005)

Posted on April 20, 2016 by Brian Wright

Worthy effort: The Big Lebowski Lite (6/10)

“I’m in. Except for no money, it’s a no-brainer for me. First off, making a stag film *has* to be a good time. Number two, my hat’s off to you. Good job. We can do this. Wha-what are we talking about here? Making a dirty movie – film, whatever, whatever. What does that require? Pointing a camera at a he and a she… he’in and a-she’in.” — Otis

This enthusiastic abandon of Otis (William Fichtner) gives you an idea of the characterological (!) method of the movie. In addition to Otis, who has this childish, charming kinetic all-directions-at-once quality, virtually every one of the characters is the epitome of quirk. [Which is why the movie reminds me so much of The Big Lebowski, at least for the Jeff Bridges role as Andy Sargentee; the key difference between The Amateurs and the Coen brothers’ classic lies in the heavier underlying plot material of Lebowski.] Continue reading →

Movie Review: Martian Child (2007)

Posted on April 13, 2016 by Brian Wright

Man meets boy struggling with “alien nation” (8/10)

Martian Child moves right along, you might say right out of the box, inasmuch as that’s where we first meet the boy Dennis (Bobby Coleman)… who thinks he’s been sent here from Mars. Dennis is a resident, with several other apparently human children, at a Seattle-ish area foster home. David (John Cusack) is a recent widower. His wife was a passionate and loving woman who wanted them to adopt, since they couldn’t have children. When David first shows up at the foster home, he’s informed by one of the other children that Dennis is the one standing inside an upside-down dishwasher shipping box (to protect him from the sun), with a peep hole in the side.

David, a successful science fiction author, does a lot of soul-searching—there are also a few charming scenes where we see David talking with Dennis and getting a handle on the Martian-child way of looking at the world—before he finally decides to go ahead. David fills out the paperwork, satisfies the stern boss man of the state fostercare system Lefkowitz (Richard Schiff) then they go back to David’s modern, swank digs and start building a relationship. Referring to the house…

“Just think of it as a bigger box.”
— David Continue reading →

Movie Review: King of California (2007)

Posted on April 6, 2016 by Brian Wright

Another offbeat exploration of possibilities (7.5/10)

Written by Mike Cahill
Directed by Mike Cahill

Michael Douglas … Charlie
Evan Rachel Wood … Miranda
Willis Burks II … Pepper

Charlie: “We used to be surrounded by nothing,”

Miranda: “We still are, but now nothing has a population,” then to herself, “I know how he feels… every time I pass the yuppie restaurants on the stretch of Clark Street formerly dominated by the Last Stop Before Expressway Liquor Store.”

I’m not exactly sure about this quote, but it’s a close approximation of Miranda’s (Evan Rachel Wood) sense of life, or at least the bleak sense of her surroundings and her chances in them. Back in childhood, father Charlie (Michael Douglas) was the quintessence of a free spirit, living the life of a musician on the road… and someone who consistently thought outside the box. As evidence: in one of Miranda’s kindergarten projects Charlie helps with assembly of a true-to-scale local Spanish mission of the 1600s, complete with native Americans lying dead in the mission square from syphilis and from routine killing rituals of the Church of Rome in the Spanish colonies. [Sorry, bad image for Easter Weekend] Continue reading →

Movie Review: True Grit (1969)

Posted on March 30, 2016 by Brian Wright

John Wayne classic still majorly entertains (9/10)

True Grit is a special movie at the end of the 1960s (1969) when Vietnam had become a major issue and crime was a concern for many Americans. I was 20. Initially receiving a II-S (student) deferment then subsequently drawing a high number in the draft lottery, I managed to avoid that expedition to the southeast Asian tropical paradise. Grit was two Duke movies after The Green Berets, a cartoon piece of corporate-government propaganda likening US military aggression on the Vietnamese people to nourishing the roots of the Liberty Tree. In that time I was a sucker for movies like Beret, and seriously considered volunteering when I walked out of the theater after watching Patton in 1970!

I grew up believing John Wayne was a god, and even had a letter to the editor published in Time Magazine—actually, I recall the letter was in response to a critic’s praising of True Grit—where in my young prose I exclaimed how the “John Wayne kind of hero” is essential for our great country. The movie was controversial, mainly because John Wayne was not a “John Wayne” kind of character, and back in the day I wasn’t sure what to make of that. What I now realize is how magnificently textured Rooster Cogburn was drawn in this suis generis film and how exactly the real John Wayne fit the character. Continue reading →

Movie Review: Juno (2007)

Posted on March 23, 2016 by Brian Wright

Special odd-cute movie on teen pregnancy (8.5/10)

This is one of those movies you can’t say too much about without giving away what’s meaningful and what happens. That being said, let’s start with the setup: Juno MacGuff (Ellen Page) is 16 years old and in a moment of curiosity decides it would be good to check out the sexual intercourse experience with her similarly artistic, offbeat, low-key, precocious boyfriend Paulie Bleeker (Michael Cera). We’re somewhere in Seattle-land, and I read that the movie was filmed near Vancouver, BC, Canada. [What is it with the movie industry making so many movies up there? Do they get cheap motel rates?]

Of course, she really does like the boy and she’s smart enough to know that sex without protection can lead to pregnancy, but for some reason the biological consequences of her curiosity in these matters do not occur to her. The beginning scenes are filled with Juno in the process of discovery and in the process of distributing the awareness of her condition to friends and family. Continue reading →

Movie Review: Charlie Wilson’s War (2007)

Posted on March 9, 2016 by Brian Wright

Back when only commies committed war crimes

Joanne Herring: Why is Congress saying one thing and doing nothing?
Charlie Wilson: Well, tradition mostly.

Charlie Wilson’s War is a good little movie. [Tom Hanks is like Clint Eastwood: no matter what they do, the film is always going to be fun and interesting to watch.] Hanks plays real life US Congressman Charles Wilson, a representative from the 2d Congressional district in East Texas 1973-1997.

He’s from a relatively simple background and so are the people he serves: “They really don’t want much, just leave them alone, let them have their guns, and be honest with them… they’ll reelect you forever.” Charlie is a good-hearted man who basically likes to party hearty; then one day in the early ’80s while lounging in a hot tub with a Playboy Bunny and other ‘associates’ in Vegas he gets religion. Continue reading →

Movie Review: Suburban Girl (2007)

Posted on March 2, 2016 by Brian Wright

Nice twist on the older man-younger woman tale (7/10)

Chloe, as they enter the library for a book signing:
“Why are we here?”
Brett: “Because I’ll never make full editor until I start mixing with the oligarchs… and he [pointing at Archie Knox] is one of them.”

Archie, on learning her name: “Let me guess, your novelist father named you after Brett Ashley in the Sun Also Rises.”
Brett: “My father’s a doctor. But yes, I was named after that character. My brother’s named Ethan… after Ethan Frome.”
Archie: “Well, as I always say, better to be named after a sensuous 1920s flapper than…”
Brett: “… than a tragic, desperate man with an ugly scar across his forehead.”

This one didn’t get much promotion, and you know the mass movie market has been restricted when the occupation of the principal character is copyeditor (sometimes called proofreader). Brett Eisenberg (Sarah Michelle Gellar) is a Manhattan literary assistant with dreams of a life doing what she loves: reading and editing books, being part of the great scene of New York idea culture. The movie intro shows her working on a manuscript using the standard proofreader markings, in pencil. Yer humble commentator once worked in these fields of the copy and deep editors, so I know the ropes or the “stets”[1] so to speak. Continue reading →