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Monthly Archives: February 2012

The Damned United – 2.75 stars

February 7, 2012
2 stars, Drama, Historical
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The Damned United is a movie about a soccer coach in Britian during the 1970s.  The coach, who is a very good coach, holds his slights and grudges dearly, which becomes his undoing.  Scripted by Peter Morgan (The Queen), it’s a fine film, but not really exceptional.  Michael Sheen is excellent as the coach, who burns himself up through ego, but the character he plays is a bit thin and one-note to justify an entire movie.  That said, one cannot sustain a career solely playing Tony Blair.

The Hangover – 4 stars

February 7, 2012
4 stars, Comedy
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The Hangover.  I expected a standard, raucous dude-flick, and I got one with inspired sequencing and a few very funny set pieces.  Four men start a Bachelor Night in Vegas with a toast, wake up with no memory, and one of the quartet is missing; we don’t see what happened, and they have to re-create their exploits through clues, such as receipts, casino chips, hospital armbands, etc . . . When the adventure ends, during the credits, a camera is found and their evening is better explained through a series of hilarious photos.  All four actors are hilarious, and Mike Tyson contributes a great cameo (how often can you say that?).

Adventureland – 3.75 stars

February 7, 2012
3 stars, Comedy, Drama
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Adventureland.  I had counted on being a worthy addition to the Knocked Up, Forgetting Sarah Marshall oeuvre, which would have been fine.  But instead, the film is more Dazed and Confused meets Tadpole (with a little Say Anything thrown in) with a deliberate pace, a keen sense of time (late 80s nod to The Replacements on the soundtrack), and a sweet love story taking the place of bro-mances, snappy male rejoinders and broad physical comedy.  It’s a very leisurely picture and an especially affecting performance by Jesse Eisenberg as the college grad consigned to working his local amusement park the summer before grad school.  Downside – Kristin Stewart as the love interest.  This limited actress who made her bones in the Twilight saga is charmless.

The Messenger – 4 stars

February 7, 2012
4 stars, Drama, War
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A subtle, surprising movie that avoids many of the easy choices and gratuitous emotionalism of similar “coming home” war films.  Woody Harrelson received a deserved nomination for best supporting actor. Harrelson played the role of grizzled Army vet who leads a notification duo to inform relatives that they have lost a loved one in Iraq, but it’s a Jeff Bridges kind of role – old, broken down, folksy, etc . . . No real stretch.   Other nominations should have gone to Ben Foster (Six Feet Under, Alpha Dog, 3:10 to Yuma) as his new partner, recently returned from Iraq after being wounded, and Samantha Morton (In America, Minority Report) as the wife of a KIA who they inform.

Crazy Heart – 2.5 stars

February 7, 2012
2 stars, Drama
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Image result for Crazy Heart

A paint-by-numbers “ole’ broke down country singer gets its together by the love of a good woman” movie.  Tender Mercies is a better picture by leaps and bounds, and while Jeff Bridges is very good, he’s not exactly breaking a sweat.  Some of T. Bone Burnett’s numbers are very catchy and authentic,  though the one that was nominated for best song is pedestrian.

The Informant – 2 stars

February 7, 2012
2 stars, Comedy
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Image result for The Informant Damon

An overly madcap, mildly amusing but eventually tedious comedy about a pathological liar (Matt Damon) turned whistleblower.  While the movie is no great shakes, Damon’s performance is excellent, and he manages to inject some humanity into what is a butt-of-a-joke, one-note character.  Given his performances from The Talented Mr. Ripley through The Departed, Damon seems never to be given the credit he is due.

The Blind Side – 3.75 stars

February 7, 2012
3 stars, Comedy, Drama
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Amazon.com: The Blind Side [Italian Edition]: sandra bullock, tim mcgraw, john lee hancock: Movies & TV

A good old fashioned heart-tugging, crowd-pleasing weepy, and Sandra Bullock’s brassy performance is perfect for the material.  The actor who plays “Big Mike” has a devastating mixture of nobility and tenderness and there are some very funny lines (Bullock’s husband – “Who would’ve thought we’d have a black son before we met a Democrat?”).

The Hurt Locker – 4 stars

February 7, 2012
4 stars, War
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Review: Is 'The Hurt Locker' Worth A Digital 4K Upgrade?

A strong war film that came under a little fire for its fantastical representation of one soldier’s experience in Iraq, circa 2004.  Admittedly, the action sequences of the ace bomb detonator (Jeremy Renner) are over-the-top.  But the sequences are exciting and director Kathryn Bigelow gets the blinding, washed-out and arid feel of urban Iraq right. 

Renner, who was nominated for Best Actor, is the weakest link, but only because he is too broadly written. He’s just a cowboy and to the extent he resonates, it is solely as reflected by his team members (Anthony Mackie and Brian Geraghty), who are both awed and mighty pissed off at his danger-junkie b.s. Their performances, as guys who just want to do the job well and get the hell out, are riveting. 

By the end, the film finds it necessary to spell out what is painfully clear, from the opening Chris Hedges quote (war is a drug) to a stateside scene with Renner and his baby where we hear Renner tell the infant (because we might not have gotten it) that he only loves one thing (danger).  Oy vey.

Bigelow’s direction, however,  is expert, she can masterfully craft battle with all of its hectic bursts and then tedious monotony.  Better, there are very short cameos by actors who can present forcefully with little screen time (Guy Pearce, David Morse, and Ralph Fiennes).

Moon – 4 stars

February 7, 2012
4 stars, Sci-Fi
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Moon.  This is a deservedly celebrated film by David Bowie’s son, who must have been influenced by “Space Oddity” and Major Tom as a child.  It’s a thoughful, affecting story about a man finishing a 3 year stint on the dark side of the moon (where, in the future, we get all of our energy) and preparing to come home to his wife and child.  He discovers an awful secret.  It’s a tight, engrossing picture and Sam Rockwell is particularly good as the main character, Sam, who is aided by his computer ala’ 2001, voiced by Kevin Spacey.

In the Loop – 5 stars

February 7, 2012
5 stars, Comedy
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A gut-busting, literate comedy about the run-up to a fictitious war (clearly meant to be Iraq) and the involvement of US and British civil servants in the process, which includes vicious political jockeying, abusive message control, mendacious leaks, pettiness of the grandest of scales, and biting insults. Armando Iannucci’s script was rightly nominated and proved to be the forerunner to the hilarious HBO series, Veep.

In many ways,  it echoes the British The Office, with politics supplanting paper. The repartee’ is smart, crackling and hilarious.  The film is a series of verbal jousts, this one, on the eve of a critical U.N. vote, being my favorite (Of course, Malcolm Tucker – Peter Capaldi – is a personal hero):

Tom Hollander (Pirates of the Caribbean and scene stealing as King George in HBO’s John Adams) is brilliant as a British minister out-of-his-depth and made a pawn, and James Gandolfini, a you can see above, is also memorable as an American general trying to slow down a march to war.