New Releases for the Week of July 28, 2017

ATOMIC BLONDE

(Focus) Charlize Theron, James McAvoy, Eddie Marsan, John Goodman, Toby Jones, Sofia Boutella, Til Schweiger, Barbara Sukowa, James Faulkner. Directed by David Leitch

The most lethal assassin in MI6 is sent on assignment to Berlin to smuggle a dossier out of the city which has been destabilized by opposing forces. In a simmering cauldron of betrayal and murder, she is allied with the embedded station chief to navigate the back alleys and halls of power to get what Her Majesty’s government requires of her. She soon realizes that she has been betrayed from within and you know what they say hell hath no fury like. This is based on the Oni Press graphic novel The Coldest City.

See the trailer, clips, interviews, B-roll video and premiere footage here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Action
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for sequences of strong violence, language throughout and some sexuality/nudity)

A Ghost Story

(A24) Casey Affleck, Rooney Mara, Kesha Sebert, Will Oldham. Recently deceased, a ghost – complete with white sheet – haunts his beloved home while silently observing his grief-stricken wife. He is also able to see other inhabitants of the house both past and present. The latest film from director David Lowery has gotten much acclaim on the festival circuit.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Fantasy
Now Playing: AMC Disney Springs, Cinemark Artegon Marketplace, Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: R (for brief language and a disturbing image)

The Emoji Movie

(Columbia) Starring the voices of T.J. Miller, James Corden, Anna Faris, Patrick Stewart. Deep in the heart of your smart phone lies a place called Textopolis where all your favorite emojis live. Each one of them has but one facial expression – except for poor Gene who has many. Wanting to be normal, he and his friends Hi-Five and Jailbreak search the phone and all its apps to find the code that will fix Gene. When unwittingly they discover a greater danger threatening the entire phone, the resourceful emojis will have to use all their skills to keep the emojis from being deleted for good.

See the trailer, a featurette and premiere footage here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard, 3D
Genre: Animated Feature
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG (for rude humor)

The Exception

(A24) Christopher Plummer, Jai Courtney, Lily James, Janet McTeer. As the Second World War looms, Kaiser Wilhelm II lives in exile in the Netherlands. A German soldier is assigned to determine whether the Dutch resistance has a spy or spies in the former ruler’s household. In the course of his investigation he falls for a Dutch Jewish girl who may or may not be the droid he’s looking for.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Historical Drama
Now Playing: Enzian Theater
Rating: R (for sexuality, graphic nudity, language and brief violence)

OPENING IN ORLANDO/DAYTONA:

Manifesto
Mubarakan
Vikram Vedha

ALSO OPENING IN MIAMI:

13 Minutes
A Family Man
Imperfections
Lady Macbeth
Landline
Mubarakan
My Father’s Land
My Journey Through French Cinema
Vikram Vedha
Wolf Warrior 2

ALSO OPENING IN TAMPA:

A Family Man
The Black Prince
Imperfections
The Last Face
Maurizio Cattelan: Be Right Back
Mubarakan

ALSO OPENING IN JACKSONVILLE:

I, Daniel Blake
Mubarakan
Vikram Vedha

SCHEDULED FOR REVIEW:

A Ghost Story
Atomic Blonde
The Emoji Movie
The Exception
Lady Macbeth
Landline

 

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New Releases for the Week of September 27, 2013

CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS 2

(Columbia) Starring the voices of Bill Hader, Anna Faris, James Caan, Will Forte, Andy Samberg, Benjamin Bratt, Terry Crews, Neil Patrick Harris. Directed by Cody Cameron and Chris Pearn

Flint Lockwood returns to Swallow Falls to find that his machine which converted rain into food has begun to evolve. Now the food is alive and in short order will be breaking out and making its way to the mainland. Flint and his crew of intrepid explorers must shut down the machine for good or the world will face an apopcornlypse of epic proporridgetions.

See the trailer, clips and a featurette here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard, 3D

Genre: Animated Feature

Rating: PG (for mild rude humor)

Baggage Claim

(Fox Searchlight) Paula Patton, Derek Luke, Taye Diggs, Boris Kodjoe.  A beautiful flight attendant is less than thrilled at the prospect of her younger sister’s wedding. Competitive to a fault, she determines that she is going to be engaged by the wedding date 30 days away and she’ll use all her connections to land Mr. Right.

See the trailer, clips and a featurette here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard (opens Thursday)

Genre: Romantic Comedy

Rating: PG-13 (for sexual content and some language)

Don Jon

(Relativity) Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Scarlett Johansson, Julianne Moore, Tony Danza. Jon has the good life Southie style; he’s got a great ride, a wicked cool pad, all the women he can handle, a family that would die for him and buddies that would kill for him. He’s also got a computer where he can watch porn night and day. Who could want anything more? Then when he meets the right girl, he discovers that there’s one part of his equation that she can’t tolerate.

See the trailer, clips and a featurette here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Romantic Comedy

Rating: PG-13 (for thematic material and brief strong language) 

Enough Said

(Fox Searchlight) Julia Louis-Dreyfus, James Gandolfini, Catherine Keener, Toni Collette. Dreading her daughter’s impending departure for college, a single mom develops a romance with a sweet and charming single dad likewise facing an empty nest. At the same time, a friendship with one of her clients grows and as it does, her friend constantly rags about her ex-husband to the point where it begins to affect her new romantic relationship until she discovers the truth about her friend’s ex.

See the trailer, clips and a featurette here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Comedy

Rating: PG-13 (for crude and sexual content, comic violence, language and partial nudity)

In a World

(Roadside Attractions) Lake Bell, Rob Corddry, Fred Melamed, Geena Davis. A young woman working as a vocal coach secretly yearns to follow in her father’s footstep and become the best voice-over actor in Hollywood. When a huge break comes her way unexpectedly, she runs smack into a wall of sexism, egotism, pride and dysfunction.

See the trailer and clips here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Comedy

Rating: R (for language including some sexual references)

Metallica: Through the Never

(Picturehouse) Dane DeHaan, James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich, Kirk Hammett. As Metallica, perhaps the most respected and beloved metal band on Earth are performing one of their epic concerts, a roadie is sent on a quest to retrieve an object that the band desperately needs for their show. As he makes his way through the city, he discovers that the landscape has become a surreal reflection of the band’s music.

See the trailer and a clip here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: IMAX 3D (opening in Standard format October 4)

Genre: Concert Film/Fantasy

Rating: R (for some violent content and language)

Rush

(Universal) Chris Hemsworth, Daniel Bruhl, Olivia Wilde, Alexandra Maria Lara. The rivalry between Formula One racers James Hunt and Niki Lauda in the 1970s was legendary, one which is still talked about by racing fans even today. But beyond the public perception was a private story that few other than those who knew the two men ever knew – until now. Oscar-winning director Ron Howard is at the helm for this high octane drama.

See the trailer, clips and a featurette here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard (opens Thursday)

Genre: Biographical Sports Drama

Rating: R (for sexual content, nudity, language, some disturbing images and brief drug use)

What’s Your Number?

Anna Faris is smokin’ hot.

(2011) Romantic Comedy (20th Century Fox) Anna Faris, Chris Evans, Ari Graynor, Blythe Danner, Joel McHale, Ed Begley Jr., Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Heather Burns, Tika Sumpter, Chris Pratt, Zachary Quinto, Anthony Mackie, Andy Samberg, Martin Freeman, Dave Annable, Thomas Lennon. Directed by Mark Mylod

 

Whatever happened to romance? Well, it turned into romantic comedies which have become so formula you can predict exactly how a movie is going to play out and what the characters are going to do from beginning to end.  And lest we forget, too many times our romantic comedies confuse sex for love which is astonishing when you think about it because the target audience for these films are women who most assuredly don’t have that confusion.

Ally (Faris) used to be a columnist for a magazine – the sort that women turn to as a bible for relationship behaviors. Unfortunately she was kind of bored with the position and lost it. Now she’s unemployed just in time for her sister Daisy’s (Graynor) wedding. Her overbearing mother (Danner) is looking for her older daughter (that would be Ally) to tie the knot but Ally’s in no hurry, having been through a succession of meaningless sexual encounters that pass for relationships.

While chatting with some of her girlfriends, a recent article in Ally’s old magazine is brought up – it mentions that women who have 20 sexual partners or more are less likely to get married. All of her friends have four or five or six….or scandalously…seven…but Ally has 19.

She begins to get fixated on this number; one more sexual partner and it’s goodbye marriage. She hit upon the idea of looking through her past boyfriends to find the one who is most likely to be marriageable material. She enlists the aid of her neighbor Colin (Evans), a womanizing musician whom she detests in tracking down some of her exes in exchange for the use of her apartment in hiding from one night stands he brings to his apartment across the hall so he doesn’t have to face them when they wake up.

So she goes through a parade of weirdoes and losers that range from a ventriloquist and puppeteer (Samberg) to a gynecologist (Lennon) to a Washington insider (Mackie). However the one she thinks is most likely to succeed is Eddie Vogel (Jackson-Cohen), who comes from wealth and runs a charitable foundation for his family.

OF course, we all know that the real Mr. Right for Ally is Colin. And we know she is going to realize it eventually but the two of them are going to have a misunderstanding. And they’re both going to be miserable. And then…well, I’m sure you know how it ends.

Yes, this is very much more of the same thing and I suppose if you like this kind of movie you’ll enjoy the hell out of this. Quite frankly, Faris is kind of hit and miss for me – I’ve always looked at her as the missing link from SNL – but here she’s hit thankfully. She can be charming and lovable when she wants to be and I guess she wanted to be here.

Evans, who had just hit a new level of stardom after Captain America: The First Avenger struck box office gold, is also charming in the same way but with a touch of goofiness. He is endearing and I know a lot of women that I’m aware of find him…well, if not hot at least lukewarm.

There is a parade of exes mostly made up of character actors and comedians and there is a bit of a spot-the-celebrity vibe to it to be honest and that’s more than a little distracting. While the chemistry between Faris and Evans is there, the rest of the movie seems hastily written; the exes could have been some good comedic fodder but instead they’re just tired old characters you’ve seen over and over again. And that really is the problem here; it’s Been There Done That 101 and while the charm is there the originality is not and it could have used some to differentiate it from the pack.

I suppose that it’s harmless entertainment – and it is – and for those who don’t want to think too hard it’s perfect for the occasion – and it is – and that the leads are nice to look at – and they are – so you can’t really complain. Still you get what you pay for and the currency here is in familiarity and not originality so let the buyer beware.

WHY RENT THIS: A certain amount of charm and a bit of chemistry between Faris and Evans.

WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: Lacks imagination and originality. Ex-boyfriends all seem to be caricatures that you wonder why Ally would be attracted to in the first place.

FAMILY VALUES:  There is a bit of sex and sexuality and a bit of foul language.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: The voice on Ally’s voice mail at the end of the film belongs to Aziz Ansari.

NOTABLE HOME VIDEO EXTRAS: In addition to the theatrical version, both the DVD and Blu-Ray releases also contain an extended version with about 13 minutes of additional footage. The Blu-Ray also has a gag reel.

BOX OFFICE PERFORMANCE: $30.4M on a $20M production budget; it didn’t quite make back its production budget and marketing costs.

COMPARISON SHOPPING: Ghosts of Girlfriends Past

FINAL RATING: 5/10

NEXT: The Sessions

New Releases for the Week of May 18, 2012

BATTLESHIP

(Universal) Taylor Kitsch, Brooklyn Decker, Alexander Skarsgard, Liam Neeson, Rihanna, Asana Tadanobu, Peter MacNicol, Joe Chrest, Rami Malek. Directed by Peter Berg

A sailor on board the USS John Paul Jones during a naval war games exercise gets a lot more than he bargained for when the Earth is invaded – by a foe lying in wait beneath the waves. Based on the board game from Hasbro, this comes from the producers of Transformers which might account for the look of the aliens.

See the trailer, clips, interviews, a promo and a featurette here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Science Fiction

Rating: PG-13 (for intense sequences of violence, action and destruction, and for language)

Darling Companion

(Sony Classics) Kevin Kline, Diane Keaton, Richard Jenkins, Dianne Wiest. After saving a bedraggled lost dog and taking it into her home, a woman pours her emotional center into the dog as she suffers from an empty nest and a distracted husband who’s a little self-involved. When the husband loses the dog while hosting a wedding at their vacation home in the Rockies, the hysterical woman will enlist the remaining guests in a frantic search for the love of her life.

See the trailer and a clip here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Comedy

Rating: PG-13 (for some sexual content including references, and language)  

The Dictator

(Paramount) Sacha Baron Cohen, Anna Faris, Ben Kingsley, Megan Fox. The brutal dictator of an Arab republic, known to encourage terrorism, is called to address the United Nations and answer for his crimes against his people. However on his way there, his prodigious beard is shaved, rendering him unrecognizable. Will he be able to fight his way back to the UN, make his address and resume abusing his country? (Opens today)

See the trailer, clips, a promo and an Academy Awards promo here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Comedy

Rating: R  (for strong crude and sexual content, brief male nudity, language and some violent images)

What to Expect When You’re Expecting

(Lionsgate) Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Lopez, Dennis Quaid, Chris Rock. A group of five couples are all expecting new arrivals – and I’m not talking deliveries from Best Buy. No, they are all going to have babies – four the usual way, one via adoption. Each has their own unique issues and all of them will intersect in one way or another. A great ensemble cast highlights this film inspired by the bestselling book that has become a bible for expectant mothers.

See the trailer and a clip here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Comedy

Rating: PG-13 (for crude and sexual content, thematic elements and language) 

New Releases for the Week of September 30, 2011

 

DREAM HOUSE

(Universal) Daniel Craig, Naomi Watts, Rachel Weisz, Marton Csokas, Claire Geare, Taylor Geare, Rachel G. Fox, Lynne Griffin, Jane Alexander, Elias Koteas, Brian Murray. Directed by Jim Sheridan

A successful New York City publisher moves his wife and two small children into a quaint home in a bucolic New England town. After they move in, they discover that the last residents of the home were murdered, an entire family with the surviving father being the main suspect in the crime. The more they look into it, the more strange things begin to occur and soon it becomes clear that the real horror might be staring them in the face.

See the trailer and promos here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Suspense Thriller

Rating: PG-13 (for violence, terror, some sensuality and brief strong language)

50/50

(Summit) Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Seth Rogen, Anna Kendrick, Bryce Dallas Howard. A young man finds out that he has a rare form of cancer. He and his best friend decide to use humor and caring as a form of treatment for his disease. This is based on the life of screenwriter Will Reiser.

See the trailer and a clip here.

For more on the movie this is the website

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Dramedy

Rating: R (for language throughout, sexual content and some drug use)

Courageous

(Tri-Star) Alex Kendrick, Kevin Downes, Ben Davies, Matt Hardwick. A tight-knit group of police officers find their world rocked when tragedy befalls one of them. Hit in the face with their shortcomings as fathers, they turn to a higher power to help them heal the rifts in their own families and become better husbands, better fathers, better men and better cops.

See the trailer, clips, promos and a featurette here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Christian Drama

Rating: PG-13 (for some violence and drug content)

Tucker and Dale vs. Evil

(Magnet) Alan Tudyk, Tyler Labine, Katrina Bowen, Jesse Moss. A group of teenagers on a camping trip run into a creepy pair of hillbillies. When one of the teens gets injured and separated from their friends, the two hillbillies – who turn out to be harmless – try to go to her aid. The others don’t see things that way however – they see a couple of murderous, sadistic backwoods serial killers out to get them and as they try to “rescue” their friend they inadvertently meet grisly demises. The trailer is really terrific – check it out.

See the trailer and clips here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Horror Spoof

Rating: R (for bloody horror violence, language and brief nudity)

What’s Your Number?

(20th Century Fox) Anna Faris, Chris Evans, Andy Samberg, Zachary Quinto. When a young woman reads a magazine article that those who have had 20 or more lovers have missed their shot at true love, she sets out to re-examine all of her exes to see if any of them measure up to being The One.

See the trailer and clips here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Comedy

Rating: R (for sexual content and language)

The House Bunny

Anna Faris would make a bodacious Bunny!

(2008) Comedy (Columbia) Anna Faris, Colin Hanks, Emma Stone, Kat Dennings, Dana Goodman, Katharine McPhee, Rumer Willis, Christopher McDonald, Beverly D’Angelo, Hugh Hefner, Kiely Williams, Holly Madison, Tyson Ritter. Directed by Fred Wolf

Sometimes we see our lives unfolding in a certain direction and we just assume that the course will remain the same eternally. However, life loves to throw us curveballs and it’s how we respond to them that really determines who we are.

Shelley Darlingson (Faris) is a Playboy playmate who has lived in the Playboy mansion for years but on her 27^th birthday, she is unceremoniously booted from the mansion by Hef himself. She didn’t do anything wrong – it’s just that she had to make room for someone younger. Ah yes; 27 and over the hill. Life can be cruel.

She finds herself at a Southern California college with nowhere to go. Through convoluted circumstances, she discovers the Zeta Alpha Zeta sorority, the campus sad sacks whose charter is about to be revoked because they have grown so unpopular, managing to attract only outsiders and losers according to collegiate way of thinking.

She becomes the house mother and teaches the girls how to be popular, something Shelley knows a lot about – and how to attract guys, which is something else Shelley knows a lot about. She does makeovers for rebellious Mona (Dennings), too-smart Natalie (Stone) and even pregnant Harmony (McPhee) and body brace encumbered Joanne (Willis). As the girls begin to strut about in skimpy outfits and lots of make-up, the guys begin to flock to Zeta house, making the other sororities jealous.

In the meantime, Shelley falls for Oliver (Hanks) and discovers her methods won’t work on him. She needs to get herself edu-ma-cated and in a hurry. In that sense, Shelley needs a makeover of her own and soon discovers that popular isn’t everything.

This is from the writers of Legally Blonde and unfortunately in a lot of ways they’re repeating themselves, from the sorority culture of So Cal to the attention to fashion and popularity. This is essentially their take on Revenge of the Nerds complete with the girls dressing up as jocks and performing a song and a jealous sorority releasing a pig in their house. I don’t mind homages but this one borders on rip-off a little too close for comfort.

Faris is a terrific comic actress who unfortunately has appeared in a lot of really terrible comedies. I’m waiting for her to appear in something worthy of her talents but to date that hasn’t happened yet. She is the best thing about the movie, even though her performance is somewhat uneven by her standards. She certainly looks good in skimpy outfits.

The other gals fare unevenly, from solid to not so much. Stone and Dennings have gone on to better roles since then; Stone in particular shows lots of promise as a lead actress and Dennings is not far behind her. Hanks also has shown some potential, although neither he nor Dennings have gotten the vehicle yet that showcase it.

A note to dumbass film critics: because women dress provocatively or seem to like sex, it doesn’t make them whores. It makes them provocatively dressed. Women probably wouldn’t dress that way if they could be taken on their own merits instead of just their physical ones. The conceit of having the girls of the sorority dress provocatively to become more popular isn’t condescending or exploitative – it’s a fact of life. Does Hollywood contribute to this? Absolutely! But then I don’t happen to think it’s a crime for a woman wanting to be noticed or thought attractive.

Anyway rant aside this is a film that isn’t going to wind up on anybody’s best lists except for those who want to see Faris’ naked derriere. It has moments, but not enough for you to go looking too hard for this, although it’s relatively easy to find.

WHY RENT THIS: Clever concept. Anna Faris has her moments.

WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: Lacks execution – could have been a bit funnier. There are scenes lifted whole cloth out of other movies, particularly Revenge of the Nerds and Legally Blonde.

FAMILY VALUES: There is some sex-related humor as well as a bit of partial nudity, not to mention a bit of strong language here and there.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Some scenes were shot inside the actual Playboy mansion.

NOTABLE DVD EXTRAS: There is a music video.

BOX OFFICE PERFORMANCE: $70.4M on a $25M production budget; the movie was a hit.

FINAL RATING: 4/10

TOMORROW: Perrier’s Bounty

Take Me Home Tonight

Topher Grace is disconcerted that Teresa Palmer has never heard of "That 70s Show."

(2011) Comedy (Rogue) Topher Grace, Teresa Palmer, Dan Fogler, Anna Faris, Chris Pratt, Michelle Trachtenberg, Lucy Punch, Michael Ian Black, Demitri Martin, Michael Biehn, Bob Odenkirk, Angie Everhart, Jay Jablonski, Edwin Hodge. Directed by Michael Dowse 

Honesty is the best policy; it has been said time and time again but few of us really regard it as true. Most of us will lie about how successful we are, how old we are, what we did during the day – even who we are – to impress someone else. In an age where lies are commonplace and Internet identities are meaningless, we sometimes forget we used to have to tell our lies face-to-face.

In a sense, Matt Franklin has been lying to himself. He is an MIT grad who doesn’t really want to be an engineer, but kinda does. He’s not sure. He’s really not sure about anything. So he lives at home with his policeman dad (Biehn) and housewife mom and twin sister Wendy (Faris) and works at Suncoast Video (are there any of those left?) in the local Mall. Oh, did I mention its 1988?

Into his mall walks Tori Frederking (Palmer), the high school crush he never had the guts to ask out because he never had an “in” and about whom he was just coincidentally talking about with his best friend Barry Nathan (Fogler), a Mercedes salesman who’s about to get fired, although he doesn’t really know it (but he kinda does). Matt nervously strikes up a conversation with his unrequited love, trying to act nonchalant but getting flustered when she mentions her successes – graduation (with honors) from Duke, a job at a high-end investment banking firm.

That’s why Matt blurts out that he’s working at Goldman Sachs, which is a bit weird because apparently they don’t have an L.A. office (which is really weird because of course they do – even in the 80s, all of the big financial firms had L.A. offices). She asks if he’s going to a party that evening, and even though he wasn’t planning to; it’s at the home of Kyle Masterson (Pratt), the smarmy preppy boyfriend of Wendy who doesn’t even know that she applied to Cambridge (which I suppose is supposed to be Oxford but who am I kidding?) or that she would move to England if she was accepted.  The letter detailing whether she got in or not sits unopened in her purse.

So yes, this is one of those “life changing party” movies that had their genesis in the ‘80s and there are plenty of nods here to the era from a decidedly John Hughes-like tone to the big hair to the cocaine use. As someone who lived in Los Angeles in the 80s, I can tell you that they did get the mall culture right, and if the movie is a bit smug in its nod to the wealthy – both of the parties depicted here are in the homes of rich people, even if Matt and Wendy live in the burbs as the children of a cop who put most of his retirement money into Matt’s education, only to see him take a job at the mall. Money well spent, eh dad?

There are a few laughs here although not nearly as many as in the similarly-themed Hot Tub Time Machine which was a much better movie than this one. Then again it’s something of a miracle we’re seeing this movie at all; it was actually filmed four years ago, but Universal, which then owned the distribution rights through their Rogue imprint didn’t feel confident about releasing it and it sat on the shelf until the Starz-owned Overture distributors bought Rogue. Overture was in turn purchased by new distributors Relativity who then added it to the release schedule.

Grace can be truly charming (as he showed in “That 70s Show”) but he looks a bit lost here. His character is so wishy-washy that it’s difficult to get behind him fully and it gets frustrating to watch him flounder, which he does for much of the movie. Fogler, who hasn’t always been impressive in his film roles, does actually manage some of his best work here – a scene where he is lured into a threesome (of sorts) in a Beverly Hills bathroom with a Cougar who turns out to be “Law & Order” hottie Angie Everhart (shockingly unrecognizable here) is one of the movie’s highlights.

Unfortunately much of the movie relies on unfunny gags and uninspired bits. The movie relies far too much on the ‘80s gimmick and poking fun at a decade which is too much like shooting fish in a barrel. I liked the Goldman Sachs reference until I realized that it was inserted in well before the financial meltdown that Goldman Sachs had such a hand in so the reference was kind of accidental.

This is one of those movies that has enough good moments so that it’s not an utter waste of time, but is frustrating because it does waste its potential. I liked the tone of the movie; it just could have used a few more laughs to keep the pace moving along.

REASONS TO GO: There are a few funny moments, particularly between Grace and Fogler. Palmer is awfully pretty and Faris has a role that is completely out of her comfort zone but she still nails it anyway.

REASONS TO STAY: Not enough laughs to sustain the movie. There is a little bit of heart and warmth and while the film nails the “look” of the era, doesn’t really capture its essence, preferring to focus on the excesses of the time.

FAMILY VALUES: A whole lot of bad words, lots of drug use, plenty of sex and nudity but hey, it’s the 80s!

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: It took four years for the movie to see the light of day, mainly over studio reluctance to show all the drug use; during the down time the title changed from “Young Americans” to “Kids in America” to the present one, taken from an Eddie Money song that while played in the trailer never appears in the film.

HOME OR THEATER: Chances are this will be gone from theaters before you can get out to see it anyway, so I’d make this a rental.

FINAL RATING: 5/10

TOMORROW: Looking for Eric

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs

I wouldn't be so calm with a monkey on my shoulder.

(Columbia) Starring the voices of Bill Hader, Anna Faris, James Caan, Mr. T, Bruce Campbell, Andy Samberg, Benjamin Bratt, Neil Patrick Harris. Directed by Chris Miller and Phil Lord

We all want to leave our mark upon the world, but for a lot of us, that boils down to one thing – impressing our parents. After all, if they can’t see us as successful, nobody else will.

Flint Lockwood (Hader) wants nothing more than to be an inventor. He has some innovative ideas, but quite frankly they don’t turn out quite the way he intended them to. The ratbirds he breeds escape into the wild, flocking around garbage cans and dumps. His remote control television develops a mind of its own and runs away. He creates a device that allows him to communicate with Steve (Harris), his monkey but Steve’s one word responses aren’t exactly what he had in mind and Steve is much more interested in ripping the moustache of his taciturn father (Caan).

His mother believes in him and encourages him, but after she passes away, he is left to be raised by his dad, a sardine fisherman who doesn’t really understand his son. The gulf between them is as wide as the Atlantic Ocean.

In fact, that’s essentially where they live, on an island well off the coast of America in the Atlantic. Swallow Falls is a company town and that company cans sardines. When the sardine market tanks, the town is left with a closed cannery, Baby Brent (Samberg) – the company mascot now grown to oversized adulthood and tons of unsold sardines which becomes the main food source for the islanders. Needless to say, they soon tire of sardines. Flint figures that he can change his status as town laughingstock by creating a device that will change water into food and sets out to build it in his backyard treehouse lab tower.

The town’s ambitious but corpulent mayor (Campbell) determines to reverse the town’s fortunes by creating Sardine Land, a destination theme park. However, Flint’s test of his rocket-powered food conversion device destroys the theme park, much to the disgust of Earl (Mr. T), the town’s lone police officer, but more importantly to the disappointment of his father. The device disappears into the stratosphere, leaving Flint once again to be the object of scorn.

Flint finds a kindred spirit in Sam Sparks (Faris), a wannabe weathercaster who thus far has been unable to rise above her intern status. Her first real assignment – covering the opening of Sardine Land – has turned into a debacle. The two are commiserating on the pier when a strange looking cloud approaches and starts to rain….cheeseburgers.

Yes, his device actually works and it creates a sensation. Thanks to Sam’s broadcast of the story, Swallow Falls becomes the center of the world’s attention. Flint goes from goat to hero in a single storm. He is able to program the menu from his lab and soon the requests come pouring in; jellybeans and ice cream for the kids, pizza and steak for the adults. Open-roofed restaurants become all the rage. The mayor happily gorges on the food that rains from the sky; there is such a surplus that a dam has to be built to hold the leftovers.

However, it turns out that there is a glitch in the software and the more that the device is asked to create, the more unstable it becomes. The food begins to get bigger and bigger until meatballs the size of Volkswagens begins to crash down from the clouds. Thanks to the incompetent mayor, the interface in Flint’s lab is destroyed. If the device isn’t shut down soon, the town will be wiped out and it is up to Flint to do it.

This is based on a children’s book popular 20 years ago, albeit very loosely. The original’s narrative was very barebones and the ink drawings not really in line with today’s animation style. The directors, who have a background in television with credits like “How I Met Your Mother” and “Clone High USA” on their resume, have crafted a movie that has received nothing but critical plaudits.

I have to admit I’m not as on board with the movie as other critics and even Da Queen are. I can admire the script which is cleverly written, full of the pop culture references that seem to be de rigueur for modern animated features, albeit in a much more subtle manner than most of them. There is a willful zaniness that owes a good deal to the Cartoon Network as much as anything else.

And maybe I’m a bit of a curmudgeon in that regard. I’m not a big fan of the Cartoon Network; I find most of the animation to be shoddy, the humor dumb and a little bit condescending to its audience. With few exceptions, most modern animated programs directed at kids seem to talk down to them.

That said, the casting is inspired. What could be more hip than having Bruce Campbell in your voice cast, and Mr. T as the acrobatic Earl is simply perfect. Everyone else does a solid job for the most part.

There are some good laughs and I suspect that most of you will probably like this a lot more than I did. I just couldn’t connect with it the way I have with things like Up, Kung Fu Panda, Wall-E and How to Train Your Dragon. That’s not a problem with the film; it’s a problem with me although I feel obliged to mention it, I can still recommend the movie to most audiences. I’m just not rating it higher because it’s the movie’s job to make that connection and it didn’t, and if it didn’t with me I’m sure that I’m not alone in that regard.

WHY RENT THIS: A well-written, clever script utilizes the pop culture references more subtly than, say, the Shrek series.

WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: Simplistic animation not up to the sophistication of Pixar’s best work.

FAMILY VALUES: No worries – this is suitable for all audiences.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Earl has the exact opposite hairstyle than his voice actor Mr. T – instead of a T-shaped Mohawk he has a T-shaped bald spot.

NOTABLE DVD EXTRAS: A music video by Miranda Cosgrove (with accompanying making-of featurettes) and a food fight game are built into the Special Edition DVD; the Blu-Ray also gives you an option to launch food at the screen while the movie is playing.

FINAL RATING: 5/10

TOMORROW: Kinky Boots

New Releases for the Week of September 18, 2009

 

Quit monkeying around!

CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS

(Columbia) Starring the voices of Bill Hader, Anna Faris, James Caan, Bruce Campbell, Andy Samberg, Mr. T, Benjamin Bratt, Neil Patrick Harris. Directed by Chris Miller and Phil Lord

A young inventor who has had let’s just say mixed success with his somewhat outlandish inventions finally creates something that actually works; a device that turns rain into food. Of course, his well-intentioned invention has some unintentional consequences in this 3D adaptation of a beloved children’s book. Directors Miller and Lord previously worked on the MTV animated series “Clone High.” Their new animated feature will be available in standard, 3D and IMAX 3D versions, so check your local multiplex to see which version is playing and decide how you want to experience hamburger precipitation.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Rating: PG (for brief mild language)

The Informant!

(Warner Brothers) Matt Damon, Scott Bakula, Joel McHale, Melanie Lynskey. When a high-ranking official and rising young star at agribusiness giant Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) approaches the FBI to blow the whistle on price fixing, it seems too good to be true. As agents of the Bureau dig deeper, however, they find out that maybe it is. Based on actual events, this is the latest romp from director Steven Soderburgh.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Rating: R (for language)

Jennifer’s Body

(20^th Century Fox) Megan Fox, Amanda Seyfried, Adam Brody, J.K. Simmons. Small town high school student Jennifer is all that – popular, gorgeous (and well-aware of the fact) and has the attitude to back it up. However, she goes from high school evil to actual, bowels-of-hell evil when she is possessed by demons. It is up to her best friend to protect the local boys from the insatiable appetite of her suddenly non-salad eating pal. This horror comedy is the latest from writer Diablo Cody, much acclaimed for her last movie (which couldn’t be more different) – Juno.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Rating: R (for sexuality, bloody violence, language and brief drug use)

Love Happens

(Universal) Jennifer Anniston, Aaron Eckhart, Judy Greer, Martin Sheen. Dr. Burke Ryan has authored a self-help book advocating that patients directly confront their own pain. He comes to Seattle to teach a seminar on what he espouses, flush with success and on the cusp of a major multimedia deal. He meets a photographer/floral shop owner who has had some serious man problems, and there’s definite attraction. However, he hasn’t been able to take his own advice. It’s a case of physician; heal thyself in this romantic comedy from first-time director Brandon Camp.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Rating: PG-13 (for some language including sexual references)

O’Horten

(Sony Classics) Baard Owe, Espen Skjonberg, Ghita Norby, Henny Moan. Odd Horten has been a train engineer most of his adult life, but it is time to retire from the thing that defined him. He is a bit lost, but also remarkably lacking in curiosity about what is going to happen to him. He drifts from one odd situation into another in this Norwegian comedy about the upheaval caused by life-changing events.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Rating: PG-13 (for brief nudity)