The Last Laugh (2019)

As you get older, life can be a gas.

(2019) Comedy (Netflix) Chevy Chase, Richard Dreyfus, Andie MacDowell, Kate Micucci, Chris Parnell, George Wallace, Lewis Black, Richard Kind, Ron Clark, Kit Willesee, Chris Fleming, Allan Harvey, Jason Batchko, Alan Demovsky, James Galea, Rafael Villegas Jr., Carol Sutton, Belinda D’Pree, Sharon Martin, Jessie Payo, Robin Wesley, Khiry Armstead, Giovannie Cruz. Directed by Greg Pritikin

 

As someone who is going to hit the big six-oh this year, films about being old have more of a resonance with me lately than usual. At the same time, as I am writing this, I’m listening to the latest album by Hamerkop.  Age is, truly, just a number.

Don’t tell Hollywood that, though. Most comedies about elderly sorts have a pretty condescending attitude towards the AARP generation. We’ll get more into that in a minute, though; let me tell you a little bit about the plot of this one though. Al Hart (Chase) was once upon a time a talent manager for some of the most talented stand-up comics in the business, but now he’s retired and mourning his wife. His granddaughter Jeannie (Micucci) is concerned that Al has been doing a lot of falling down lately. She is anxious for him to move into a facility where he can be seen to; Al is against the idea but after a particularly nasty spill agrees reluctantly.

At the retirement village, Al discovers Buddy Green (Dreyfus) is a resident. Buddy was Al’s first client and had the makings of being a major star; Al had him booked on the Ed Sullivan show which would have established Buddy as a major star. Inexplicably, he never showed up and turned his back on comedy, instead choosing to raise a family and become a podiatrist. Talk about the shoe being on the other foot.

But the what-ifs have never really left Buddy and Al, seeing the parade of residents to the morgue figures that Buddy deserves a last shot to see if he had the stuff; he books Buddy on a cross-country tour, starting off in cruddy venues in Podunk towns gradually working up to bigger shows until the big one – the Stephen Colbert Late Show in the Ed Sullivan theater in New York. Along the way, the two bicker like an old couple, pick up a free-spirited artist in Kansas City (MacDowell) that Al becomes sweet on, and discover that it’s never too late to pursue a dream.

If that last sentence sounds a bit maudlin, it’s meant to. The movie plays it about as safe as a movie can be played, with the exception of a magic mushroom sequence in which Al trips, imagining a musical number and a carriage ride with Abe Lincoln at the reins. No, I don’t know why.

Remember I talked about Hollywood’s condescending attitude towards the aging? This is the kind of movie that portrays old folks doing shrooms and having sex as kind of “isn’t that cute.” Let’s do the math; people turning 70 this year were born in 1950; they were in their teens and 20s in the 60s and 70s when just about everyone was doing drugs and having sex. I think Hollywood sees the elderly still as the Leave it to Beaver generation, except that they were doing drugs and having sex back then too. Guess what, America? Your grandparents used to get high and fool around. Get over it.

Worse still, the humor is of the safe, don’t-offend-anyone variety, which makes me want to scream. I’m not the biggest Chevy Chase fan ever, but dammit, the man was an integral part of the original Not Ready for Prime Time Players, and played a major role in one of the most subversive comedies ever made – Caddyshack. Can we not accept that there are some great comedic minds hitting their 70s now and capable of making comedies that can be bigger game changers than some of the modern crop of comics are currently capable of making? Dreyfus – who is as good as he ever was in this movie – as well as Chase and MacDowell all deserve better than this mildly entertaining, eminently forgettable project.

REASONS TO SEE: Dreyfus is a gift.
REASONS TO AVOID: Unnecessarily maudlin.
FAMILY VALUES: There is a good amount of profanity including plenty of sexual references, as well as some drug use and adult themes.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: This is the first leading role for Chase in a mainstream film since Snow Day in 2000.
BEYOND THE THEATERS: Netflix
CRITICAL MASS: As of 5/30/20: Rotten Tomatoes: 53% positive reviews, Metacritic: 31/100
COMPARISON SHOPPING: The Sunshine Boys
FINAL RATING: 6/10
NEXT: Glass

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Love, Gilda

Gilda and Gene as a couple were amazingly cute.

(2018) Documentary (Magnolia) Gilda Radner, Gene Wilder, Chevy Chase, Laraine Newman, Melissa McCarthy, Amy Poehler, Bill Hader, Lorne Michaels, Michael F. Radner, Martin Short, Maya Rudolph, Paul Shaffer, Stephen Schwartz, Alan Zweibel, Robin Zweibel, Rosie Shuster, Cecily Strong, Andrew Alexander, Janis Hirsch, Anne Beatts. Directed by Lisa DaPolito

 

It’s not taking a controversial stance by declaring that Gilda Radner was one of the greatest comedians of her era and one of the greatest ever. Although she passed away at a too-young 43 in 1989, her best work on Saturday Night Live still holds up even now, 40 years later.

It’s hard to believe but for most people under 30 she’s been gone their entire lifetime. Fortunately there’s a documentary that will not only play on the nostalgic chords of baby boomers and others who are middle aged, it may introduce her to a whole new generation that didn’t get to be captivated by her amazing smile, who didn’t get to enjoy her compelling characters or laugh at her gentle humor.

The documentary is mostly told in Radner’s own words as we hear excerpts of her audio recordings that she used while writing her autobiography It’s Always Something which would be published two weeks after her death. She was also an insatiable diarist and we get to hear some of her most intimate thoughts read by modern comedians (and SNL alumni themselves) like Bill Hader, Melissa McCarthy and Amy Poehler.

We also get to see plenty of home movies of her youth, backstage footage from her debut performance in Godspell in Toronto as well as from her one-woman Broadway show after her stint on SNL came to an end (but strangely, very little backstage or rehearsal footage from SNL itself). There are also some home movies from her brief but fulfilling marriage to Gene Wilder, some of it taken during cancer treatments during the last years of her life. Even though she remained optimistic despite the advanced stages of her ovarian cancer when it was detected, there came a point when she knew she wasn’t going to survive and she confessed as much to some of her closest friends. She faced the end with grace and humor as you might expect.

Radner was never a radical feminist but she did a lot of trailblazing for women particularly in the field of comedy which was then definitely a boys club (and is still so to a lesser but still profound effect today). Female comics revere her and rightfully so for that reason. She made inroads not by demonstrating but by doing; she wasn’t the sort to get in anyone’s face and scream. She knew there was discrimination against women but in her own non-confrontational way she fought against it. It didn’t hurt that nobody could deny she wasn’t as hysterically funny as her male counterparts, maybe more so in a lot of cases.

Given the amount of personal information and observations that the filmmakers were privy to, some aspects of her life seem to have little flesh on them when displayed here. We get that she spent most of her life looking for true love and being devastated when her latest boyfriend or husband (Wilder was her third marriage) didn’t work out. She wanted to be adored, but was intrinsically shy and preferred privacy even as she loved being in front of people, perhaps less than being with people. At least, that’s what I can glean from what is shown here; I may be way off-base. That’s the problem with documentary movies; the filmmaker has an hour and a half to dig into a life so often we are just left with the highlights and not so much with the blanks being filled in. I really wanted DaPolito to spend more time on her relationship with Wilder but we really didn’t get much more than we could glean from reading contemporary accounts in People magazine.

Radner’s fans will likely love the stroll down memory lane but be disappointed by the insight of which there could have been a lot more. I also found it surprising that the only members of the original cast to appear in the documentary were Newman and Chase; Aykroyd, Curtin and Morris are not to be seen nor is Bill Murray and his brother Brian (both of whom dated Radner at separate times back in the day) from the second season. That’s a shame to me and I don’t know why the missing members declined to appear (if indeed they did) or why DaPolito failed to ask them (if she didn’t).

Still, it is a worthy tribute to one of the most iconic performers of her era, one whose influence still resonates in the comedy business today. Even if it isn’t entirely satisfying from one hoping to gain more insight into what made her tick, I think for most people this is another – or maybe a first – opportunity to love Gilda.

REASONS TO GO: The excerpts from classic SNL sketches still hold up well. The journal entries are both poignant and illuminating.
REASONS TO STAY: The section on her relationship with Gene Wilder could have used some fleshing out.
FAMILY VALUES: There is some profanity as well as drug references.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Radner based her Emily Litella character on her nanny whom she considered her second mom.
BEYOND THE THEATERS:  Amazon, Fandango Now, Google Play, iTunes, Microsoft, Vudu, YouTube
CRITICAL MASS: As of 9/25/18: Rotten Tomatoes: 84% positive reviews. Metacritic: 73/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Robin Williams: Come Inside My Mind
FINAL RATING: 7.5/10
NEXT: Painless

New Releases for the Week of September 21, 2018

THE HOUSE WITH A CLOCK IN ITS WALLS

(Universal) Jack Black, Cate Blanchett, Owen Vaccaro, Kyle McLaughlin, Colleen Camp, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Sunny Suljic, Lorenza Izzo. Directed by Eli Roth

Horror auteur Roth goes the Spielberg route with this young adult book-adaption.  A young orphan goes to live with his eccentric uncle who lives in a creepy old house in a sleepy old town. When the orphan accidentally wakes the dead, he, his uncle (who turns out to be a warlock) and a kindly neighbor (who is also a witch) race to stop a clock hidden inside the house from counting down to zero which will bring about the end of everything

See the trailer and trailer commentary here
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard, D-Box, Dolby, IMAX, RPX, XD
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG (for thematic elements including sorcery, some action, scary images, rude humor and language)

Assassination Nation

(Neon) Suki Waterhouse, Anika Noni Rose, Joel McHale, Bill Skarsgård. A quartet of high school girls and BFFs in a small town live like most girls their age do – through social media, texts, selfies and gossip. When an anonymous hacker starts posting intimate details of the lives of people in their town, things start to go more than a little crazy and soon there’s a 50-50 chance the girls will live through the night but what nobody gets is these aren’t girls you want to mess with.

See the trailer and video featurettes here
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Action
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for disturbing bloody violence, strong sexual material including menace, pervasive language, and for drug and alcohol abuse – all involving teens)

Bad Reputation

(Magnolia) Joan Jett, Michael J. Fox, Deborah Harry, Kenny Laguna. Ever since founding the Runaways, Joan Jett has been an inspiration for women rockers everywhere. Over the years she has managed to become a feminist icon as well. This is the story of a woman who decided to play by her own rules.

See the trailer here
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Music Documentary
Now Playing: Enzian Theater (Wednesday only)
Rating: R (for language, sexual references, some drug use and brief nudity)

Fahrenheit 11/9

(Briarcliff) Michael Moore, David Hogg, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Donald Trump. Gadfly and agent provocateur Moore is back and once again looking at our society and asking the tough questions. How did we elect someone who plainly is not fit for the job and how do we get out of the situation we’re in?

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Documentary
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for language and some disturbing material/images)

Life Itself

(Amazon) Oscar Isaac, Olivia Wilde, Annette Bening, Mandy Patinkin. When a young couple get pregnant, the reverberations sent by the happy event go through their extended family and across the country.

See the trailer, video featurettes and a clip here
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Drama
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for language including sexual references, some violent images and brief drug use)

Lizzie

(Saban/Roadside Attractions) Chloë Sevigny, Kristen Stewart, Kim Dickens, Jamie Sheridan. This is an unusual take on the Lizzie Borden mystery which more than a century later remains unsolved.

See the trailer, clips, video featurettes and an interview here
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: True Life Mystery
Now Playing: AMC Altamonte Mall, AMC Disney Springs, Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: R (for violence and grisly images, nudity, a scene of sexuality and some language)

Love, Gilda

(Magnolia) Gilda Radner, Gene Wilder, Melissa McCarthy, Chevy Chase. Radner was one of the stars of the original Saturday Night Live and her characters continue to live on in popular culture more than 40 years later. She remains a major influence on comics – especially those of the fairer sex – to this day.

See the trailer here
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Biographical Documentary
Now Playing: Enzian Theater
Rating: NR

ALSO OPENING IN ORLANDO/DAYTONA:

American Dresser
Batti Gul Meter Chalu
Beyond the Sky
The Cakemaker
The Children Act
Little Italy
Miss Granny
Nannu Dochukunduvate
Saamy Square

ALSO OPENING IN MIAMI/FT. LAUDERDALE:

Batti Gul Meter Chalu
Bel Canto
Bye Bye Brazil
The Children Act
I Think We’re Alone Now
Mandy
Nannu Dochukunduvate
Pick of the Litter
Saamy Square
The Song of Sway Lake

ALSO OPENING IN TAMPA/ST. PETERSBURG:

American Dresser
The Children Act
Little Italy
Nannu Dochukunduvate
The Pagan King
Saamy Square

ALSO OPENING IN JACKSONVILLE/ST. AUGUSTINE:

Custody
Miss Granny
Nannu Dochukunduvate
Saamy Square

SCHEDULED FOR REVIEW:

American Dresser
Assassination Nation
Bad Reputation
Bel Canto
The Cakemaker
Fahrenheit 11/9
The House With a Clock In Its Walls
Life Itself
Love, Gilda

New Releases for the Week of March 30, 2018

READY PLAYER ONE

(Warner Brothers) Tye Sheridan, Olivia Cooke, Ben Mendelsohn, T.J. Miller, Simon Pegg, Mark Rylance, Ralph Ineson, Claire Higgins, Laurence Spellman, Perdita Weeks. Directed by Steven Spielberg

Based on a bestselling book by Ernest Cline, the movie shows a dreary future in which there are few jobs and little hope. When the owner of the OASIS, a virtual reality world which is also the richest corporation in the world, dies suddenly it is revealed that there is a hidden Easter Egg that will give the finder control of the corporation and a virtually unlimited fortune. A young gamer sets out to claim the ultimate prize and his knowledge of the 1980s may be his big advantage

See the trailer, interviews, video featurettes, motion posters and SXSW premiere coverage here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard, 3D, DBOX, DBOX-3D, Dolby Atmos, IMAX, IMAX 3D, RPX, RPX-3D, XD, XD-3D
Genre: Science Fiction
Now Playing: Wide Release (opens Thursday)
Rating: PG-13 (for sequences of sci-fi action violence, bloody images, some suggestive material, nudity and language)

Baaghi 2

(Fox Star) Disha Patani, Tiger Shroff, Randeep Hooda, Manoj Bajpayee. A detective is hired by an ex-lover to find their daughter, who has been kidnapped. Baaghi 3 has already been approved and will be filming later this year.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Thriller
Now Playing: AMC West Oaks
Rating: NR  

Birthmarked

(Vertical) Matthew Goode, Toni Collette, Fionnula Flanagan, Michael Smiley. Two scientists quit their jobs to take on the ultimate scientific experiment; to determine once and for all the nature vs. nurture question. To do this, they decide to raise three children contrary to their genetic predispositions. Have fun with that.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Comedy
Now Playing: AMC Universal Cineplex
Rating: NR

Finding Your Feet

(Roadside Attraction) Imelda Staunton, Celia Imrie, Timothy Spall, Joanna Lumley. After discovering her husband of 25 years has been cheating on her, an upper class British woman moves in with her Bohemian older sister. The two women agree on virtually nothing but when the elder sibling gets the younger involved in her dance class, there are sea changes ahead for both of them.

See the trailer and a clip here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Dramedy
Now Playing: Regal Winter Park Village, Rialto Spanish Springs Square
Rating: PG-13 (for suggestive material, brief drug use and brief strong language)

Flower

(The Orchard) Zoey Deutch Kathryn Hahn, Adam Scott, Joey Morgan. A teenage girl who is beginning to experiment sexually forms an unlikely and unorthodox relationship with her mentally unstable step-brother.

See the trailer and a video featurette here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Comedy
Now Playing: AMC Universal Cineplex
Rating: R (for crude sexual content and language throughout, graphic nude drawings, some drug content and a brief violent image)

Foxtrot

(Sony Classics) Lior Ashkenazy, Sarah Adler, Yonathan Shiray, Shira Haas. An Israeli family must come to terms with their own dysfunction when things go terribly wrong at their son’s isolated military outpost. This was Israel’s official submission for the 2018 Foreign Language Oscar.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Dramedy
Now Playing: Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: R (for some sexual content including graphic images, and brief drug use)

God’s Not Dead: A Light in Darkness

(Pure Flix) David A.R. White, Tatum O’Neil, Ted McGinley, John Corbett. A pastor must reaffirm his faith after his church burns to the ground.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Faith-Based Drama
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG (for thematic elements including some violence and suggestive material)

Goldstone

(Lightyear) Aaron Pederson, Jacki Weaver, David Wenham, David Gulpilil. A young indigenous detective arrives in an Australian frontier town on a missing persons inquiry. His investigation opens up a web of corruption and deceit that he couldn’t have expected. He must work with the local police detective if he is to solve the case – or survive it.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Drama
Now Playing: Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: NR  

The Last Movie Star

(A24) Burt Reynolds, Chevy Chase, Ellar Coltrane, Clark Duke. An aging movie star must reluctantly face the reality that his best years are behind him. Like all of us, he must adjust to and accept the reality of growing old. This was released initially exclusively for DirecTV subscribers and is now making a brief theatrical run as well as becoming available on VOD.

See the trailer, a clip and a video featurette here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Comedy
Now Playing: AMC Universal Cineplex
Rating: R (for some sexuality and partial nudity)

Tyler Perry’s Acrimony

(Lionsgate) Taraji P. Henson, Lyriq Bent, Crystle Stewart, Jazmyn Simon. They say that hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. When a faithful wife discovers that her husband has been cheating on her, she reaches the boiling point and means to take revenge on his ass – by any means necessary.

See the trailer, clips, interviews and B-roll video here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Thriller
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for strong sexuality, graphic nudity, language and a brief disturbing image)

ALSO OPENING IN ORLANDO/DAYTONA:

The Cage Fighter
First Reformed
Outside In
Rangasthalam

ALSO OPENING IN MIAMI/FT. LAUDERDALE:

Journey’s End
Rangasthalam

ALSO OPENING IN TAMPA/ST. PETERSBURG:

Caught
Rangasthalam
Status Update

ALSO OPENING IN JACKSONVILLE/ST. AUGUSTINE:

None

SCHEDULED FOR REVIEW:

Caught
Finding Your Feet
Ready Player One

Vacation

Some swimming holes are best left alone.

(2015) Comedy (New Line) Ed Helms, Christina Applegate, Skyler Gisondo, Steele Stebbins, Chris Hemsworth, Leslie Mann, Chevy Chase, Beverly D’Angelo, Charlie Day, Catherine Missal, Ron Livingston, Norman Reedus, Keegan-Michael Key, Regina Hall, Emyri Crutchfield, Alkoya Brunson, Nick Kroll, Tim Heidecker, Michael Pena, Colin Hanks, Kaitlin Olson, Hanna Davis, Kristin Ford. Directed by John Francis Daley and Jonathan M. Goldstein

Vacations are the source of a good percentage of our fondest memories. Who can forget that road trip to a national park, or to Disney World, or that trip to grandma’s house in the country? These are memories we carry with us for a lifetime.

Rusty Griswold (Helms) can vouch for that. As a pilot for a small commuter airline, he is used to flights in which the final descent begins five minutes after take-off. He is a decent sort, if a little bit on the white bread side. He has two kids; James (Gisondo) is the eldest who wants nothing more than to play guitar and daydream. The other one, Kevin (Stebbins) who might well have been named Satan, bullies his older brother unmercifully and doesn’t really have respect for anyone to be honest. His wife Debbie (Applegate) is beautiful but the spark has gone out of their marriage in a big way.

Rusty decides that rather than go to the same Michigan cabin the family has gone to for years on their vacation, he’d take a page out of his own scrapbook and take his family on a road trip to Southern California’s best theme park, Wally World.

However, his family is less than enthusiastic about the idea, especially when he turns up in a rented van, from the Honda of Albania with a key fob that does everything but what normal key fobs do. It is the only vehicle where the cup holders are on the outside of the car and comes with a self-destruct mechanism, which can be activated by pressing the swastika button on the fob.

Getting to Wally World will include detours to the most vile hot springs on earth, a visit with Rusty’s sister Audrey (Mann) and her hunky meteorologist husband Stone Crandall (Hemsworth) who is more than happy to see Debbie, a visit to Debbie’s old sorority house in Memphis where Rusty learns a few things about his wife that he never knew, a stop to go white water kayaking in the Grand Canyon with a guide (Day) who’s having a horrible day, and finally, a stop in San Francisco to visit some familiar faces.

This is a peculiar entry into the franchise as it is both a reboot and a sequel; it’s a reboot in the sense that it is a brand new entry in the franchise after years of inactivity with an entirely new cast, and it takes place where the events of National Lampoon’s Vacation and its sequel happened. It can even be said to be a remake since the plot of this one is essentially the same as the first.

Ed Helms, the sixth actor to play Rusty (which is some kind of record), takes over for Chevy Chase as the head of the Griswold clan. Like Clark, Rusty is both optimistic and oblivious. He tries to do what’s best for his family but often overlooks not just what his family wants but simple common sense as well. He, like his dad before him, is the king of good intentions gone bad. Helms is a terrific comic actor who not only highlighted the Hangover franchise but was amazing as a lead in Cedar Rapids as well. This is less successful in that sense but not because of anything Helms did or didn’t do; we’ll get into that in a minute.

Applegate, like Beverly D’Angelo before her, is a gorgeous blonde who tries to reign in her husband’s quirkier inclinations but unlike the Ellen Griswold character, Debbie isn’t happy in her marriage. Given her wild past, that’s not unexpected. Applegate is one of the most underrated leading ladies out there, particularly in the comedy genre. She has great comic timing, is sexy as all get out and can play just about any character she chooses to. She doesn’t get the leading roles that a Tina Fey or an Amy Poehler might get (or even a Cameron Diaz) but she is to comedies what Maria Bello is to dramas; a strong, beautiful and desirable performer who never upstages the lead.

The rest of the cast is pretty decent with plenty of cameos by fairly well-known names (although I must admit that the Chase/D’Angelo cameo was the most welcome) but the best support actually comes from Stebbins as the badger of an 8-year-old who humiliates his teenage brother and is essentially an unholy terror. Some of the best moments in the movie are his.

The humor here is like a lot of comedies, very hit or miss depending on your sense of humor. There is a lot of scatological jokes and plenty of rude, crude bits that may either delight your inner twelve-year-old boy or cause you to purse your lips in distaste. Many of the best jokes (the hot springs incident) are spoiled by their appearance in the trailer sadly, so be warned. They do get the family bonds thing right, so in that sense this movie has the same vibe as its 1983 predecessor. That much is entirely welcome.

This isn’t the greatest comedy you’ll see this summer. It isn’t even the best of the Vacation movies, albeit it is the first without the National Lampoon label. However, it has enough going on that’s good to give it a mild recommendation. Think of it as less of a Vacation and more of a weekend getaway.

REASONS TO GO: Some of the scenes are genuinely funny – most of them appear in the trailer. Helms and Applegate are always engaging.
REASONS TO STAY: Very, very hit and miss. Something of a hot mess.
FAMILY VALUES: Plenty of crude humor, sexual situations, brief graphic nudity and foul language throughout.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Released on the same day as the original – July 29 – only 32 years later.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 8/17/15: Rotten Tomatoes: 27% positive reviews. Metacritic: 33/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: National Lampoon’s Vacation
FINAL RATING: 5.5/10
NEXT: Walt Before Mickey

New Releases for the Week of July 31, 2015

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – ROGUE NATION

(Paramount) Tom Cruise, Rebecca Ferguson, Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg, Alec Baldwin, Ving Rhames, Simon McBurney, America Olivo. Directed by Christopher McQuarrie

The IMF is on the verge of being shuttered by a government that doesn’t truly understand how unique they are and what they do to protect not just the United States but the world. In this tumultuous time they come up against their greatest foe – the Syndicate. Long a rumor in the intelligence community, IMF Agent Ethan Hunt has discovered that they are real and out to destroy the IMF by any means necessary. How does one fight a mirror image of oneself, a group trained to do what the IMF does, only more ruthless and amoral – a rogue nation in the intelligence community? The remaining agents of the IMF must find a way.

See the trailer, interviews, featurettes and a clip here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard, IMAX (opens Thursday)
Genre: Action
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG-13 (for sequences of action and violence, and brief partial nudity)

Drishyam

(White Hill/Viacom18) Ajay Devgn, Tabu, Shriya Saran, Rajat Kapoor. When the teenage son of a powerful and corrupt police officer disappears, suspicion falls on the family of a local cable TV outlet in the remote village of Goa. The father, a thrifty man who dropped out of the 4th grade as an orphan and made what little he has off of hard work and determination, will do anything to protect his family. Absolutely anything – and he’ll have to pull out all the stops as his powerless family feels the full weight of the law coming down upon them.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Thriller
Now Playing: Touchstar Southchase
Rating: NR

The Farewell Party

(Goldwyn) Ze’ev Revach, Levana Finkleshtein, Aliza Rosen, Ilan Dar. A handyman and mechanical prodigy is now living out his golden years tinkering with gadgets and hanging out with a group of friends who are also retired. When a close friend begs him to help her husband end his suffering, he devises a euthanasia machine which the sufferer can operate and end the life at the moment of his or her choosing. It was meant to be used once, but word gets out and soon he has become a serial killer according to his wife who is not at all happy with what he is doing. But when she is diagnosed with a terminal illness, suddenly the usefulness of his machine takes a whole new turn. This Florida Film Festival favorite from last spring is now making a run at the Enzian; you can read my Festival review of it here.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Dramedy
Now Playing: Enzian Theater
Rating: NR

The Human Centipede III: Final Sequence

(IFC Midnight) Dieter Laser, Eric Roberts, Lawrence Harvey, Bree Olsen. A sadistic prison warden and his accountant are in the crosshairs of the governor who finds their methods extreme. After watching the first two movies in The Human Centipede series, the accountant hits upon the idea of suturing the prison population face to anus in a gigantic 500-person human centipede. The warden is at first dismissive but at last comes around, leading to general ickiness. Critics have lambasted the film but it is likely to appeal to the sick and twisted, and those who love them. One showing only, at 11:59pm Friday.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Horror Comedy
Now Playing: Enzian Theater
Rating: NR

Jimmy’s Hall

(Sony Classics) Barry Ward, Francis Magee, Aileen Henry, Simone Kirby. Jimmy runs a dance hall that is also a center for discourse and social life for the Irish rural town in the 1920s. The fun the powers that be might tolerate but not the nascent anti-church socialist talks and the hall is shut down and Jimmy chased out of the country. A decade later, he returns at the height of the Depression, with the objective to live a quiet life and take care of his ailing ma. However, he sees that the grip of the church and the powerful is tighter than ever. He will have to fight the same losing battle all over again, but this time he is determined to win.

See the trailer and a clips here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Drama
Now Playing: Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: PG-13 (for language and a scene of violence)

Twinsters

(Small Package) Samantha Futerman, Anais Bordier. Two young girls who were adopted from South Korea believe they are twins who were separated by birth. Although they were adopted by families on two different continents, they look nearly identical and are determined to discover the truth about their birth but the dive into this particular pool is not an easy one and there are all kinds of rocks and dangers to contend with.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Documentary
Now Playing: Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: NR

Vacation

(New Line) Ed Helms, Christina Applegate, Chris Hemsworth, Chevy Chase. Rusty Griswold decides to take a page out of his father’s book and take his family on a road trip. When you’re a Griswold, you can never say die after all and Wally World is a shining El Dorado in the distance. However, when you’re a Griswold, vacations are never easy.

See the trailer, clips, interviews, a promo and B-roll video here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard (opened Wednesday)
Genre: Comedy
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for crude and sexual content and language throughout, and brief graphic nudity)

Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead: The Story of the National Lampoon

Shenanigans in a bygone era.

(2015) Documentary (4th Row) Henry Beard, Matty Simmons, Bruce McCall, P.J. O’Rourke, Tony Hendra, Anne Beatts, Christopher Buckley, Ellis Weiner, Al Jean, Chevy Chase, Sean Kelly, Ivan Reitman, Judd Apatow, Jon Landis, Michael Gross, Judith Jacklin Belushi, Chris MIller, Danny Abelson, Mike Reiss, Beverly D’Angelo, Jerry Taylor, Brian McConnachie, Meatloaf, Kevin Bacon, Billy Bob Thornton. Directed by Doug Tirola

In the interest of transparency, I was a Mad magazine kid growing up and the National Lampoon, while on my radar, was a bit more sophisticated than my young mind could grasp. However, there’s no denying that for the last 40 years, the Lampoon has been essentially the wellspring of American humor, From its pages, films, radio and stage shows have come some of the most important writing and performing talents in comedy. It has directly or indirectly inspired the comedy of Saturday Night Live, The Simpsons and the comedies of John Hughes, Jon Landis and Judd Apatow. Even for those who weren’t directly involved with either writing it or reading it, its influence has shaped them whether they’ve known it or not.

The Lampoon began with the Harvard Lampoon, one of the country’s oldest humor magazines. Two Harvard grads who’d worked on the magazine (and also co-wrote the now-classic parody novel Bored of the Rings) named Douglas Kenney and Henry Beard. After creating some parody magazines for such publications as Mademoiselle, they got together with Matty Simmons to create the National Lampoon.

The nascent magazine was able to attract such talent as writers Michael O’Donoghue, P.J. O’Rourke and Anne Beatts, as well as artists like Rick Meyerowitz and Michael Gross. Their heyday, during the heady days of Watergate and Vietnam, reflected the country’s angst, anger and frustrations but also pushed the boundaries of humor beyond what had been acceptable what to then. The Lampoon printed what most people were already thinking, only funnier.

The magazine was as rock and roll as comedy ever gets and as most students of rock know, that’s a double edged sword. Sure the magazine was innovative and ahead of its time in many ways, but the creative forces that powered it were prone to drug addiction, burn-out and attrition. While the 70s waned and the 80s waxed, the magazine which had by then branched out into films with Animal House and National Lampoon’s Vacation series, had lost most of those who were it’s creative soul – Kenney died under mysterious circumstances in 1980 and the company really never recovered.

But oh, what a legacy it has left behind. The filmmakers sift through hundreds of hours of archival footage including their stage shows, audio of their radio show and page after page after page of their magazine. Those who were readers of the magazine will get a nice sense of nostalgia while those who weren’t will get a wonderful opportunity for discovery. Nearly the entire original cast of Saturday Night Live worked on the Lampoon stage show, and director John Hughes was on the writing staff during the later years of the magazine, as were Simpsons show runners Al Jean and Mike Reiss.

There are a ton of interviews with the surviving staff of the magazine’s golden era, with Simmons and Beard getting the lion share of face time, while much attention is paid to the writers, artists, performers and celebrity fans of the magazine and its spinoffs. While this isn’t groundbreaking style here, because the material is just so freaking funny (I was breathless with laughter when the film finally spun its final credits) that I’m willing to overlook the lack of innovation, which is a bit ironic since the magazine was known for innovation.

Be that as it may, this is one of the funniest films you’ll see all year and likely for a lot of years to come. Even though some of the material is dated, a lot of it is timeless as well and is as funny now as it was then. Whether you’r of the generation that made the magazine what it was or a Johnny-come-lately, this is a don’t-miss documentary that you should be absolutely certain to catch when it hits the festival circuit near you, or hopefully when it gets a richly deserved distribution deal and shows up either theatrically or on VOD. Whatever the case may be, see it. Or I’ll shoot this dog.

REASONS TO GO: Excepts from Lampoon radio broadcasts and live shows hysterical. The source for humor in its era.
REASONS TO STAY: Definitely a product of its era. Lots and lots of talking heads.
FAMILY VALUES: Nudity, crude and sexual humor, plenty of foul language and drug use.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: The movie’s poster was drawn by Rick Meyerowitz who also drew the poster for National Lampoon’s Animal House and is modeled on its design.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 4/12/15: Rotten Tomatoes: no score yet. Metacritic: no score yet.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Live From New York!
FINAL RATING: 8/10
NEXT: Welcome to Leith

Hot Tub Time Machine 2

The requisite non-drug user accidental drug ingestion sequence.

(2015) Sci-Fi Comedy (Paramount/MGM) Rob Corddry, Craig Robinson, Clark Duke, Adam Scott, Gillian Jacobs, Chevy Chase, Collette Wolfe, Bianca Haase, Jason Jones, Kumail Nanjiani, Kellee Stewart, Josh Heald, Gretchen Koerner, Lisa Loeb, Jessica Williams, Bruce Buffer, Mariana Paola Vicente, Adam Herschman, Kisha Sierra, Olivia Jordan. Directed by Steve Pink

Second chances don’t come easily or often. We generally have one shot at making the right choice. Being human, we don’t always make the right choice, which is where the need for second chances come in.

After having gone back in time and in the process changing their lives for the better, the three buddies are beginning to get a little, well, bored. Lou (Corddry) is a former metal God and tech mogul who’s search engine “Lougle” has slowly been losing market share and is in danger of going under, although Lou – hopelessly coked out, drunk and hooked on whatever drugs he can get his hands on – stays the blissfully ignorant course.

Nick (Robinson) has become one of the biggest recording artist/producers in the world using songs other people wrote – before they wrote them, such as the Lisa Loeb hit “Stay (I Missed You)” (the bespectacled singer makes a cameo as a cat wrangler who confides to Nick that every time she hears his version of the song she feels oddly violated). However, he continues to be somewhat henpecked by his wife Courtney (Stewart).

Jacob (Duke) is essentially Lou’s butler as well as his son and is headed down a similar road as Lou has taken. The relationship between the two continues to be strained.

Then at a party, a mysterious figure shoots Lou in the crotch. Jacob has somehow managed to secret the hot tub time machine in a hidden room in the house. Figuring out that someone had used the time machine in the future to come back and assassinate Lou, they head to the future to try and discover who – among many suspects – would want to murder Lou.

In 2025 they meet Adam (Scott), the son of their fourth member who has apparently disappeared into a dimension all his own. In an era where the loser of a high school classmate Gary Winkle (Jones) has become wealthy because Lou was a dick to him in 2015, where reality TV game shows include virtual anal rape, where smart cars can be homicidal, and where masturbation has gotten the ultimate high tech aid, the crew bumbles through trying to locate the man who shot Lou and stop him from carrying out the plan, leaving Lou to wink out of existence.

The first Hot Tub Time Machine was an example of a movie in which I had low expectations for and was pleasantly surprised; the sequel is an example of a movie in which I had high expectations for and was sadly disappointed. This is nowhere near as funny as the first movie and definitely suffers for the lack of John Cusack who was essentially the anchor of the first film. Corddry, Robinson and Duke were more or less supporting characters and now have to take center stage. Corddry, who was especially good in the first movie, really doesn’t have anywhere to go with his one-dimensional character other than performing the same kind of actions. It’s not as good the second time around.

There are some laughs to be sure, but the movie needs an anchor. A lead character who the action swirls around. Instead we have hear a selection of supporting characters waiting for a straight man. Having Adam Scott – a very talented comic actor – in the mix is a good move, but he doesn’t really have a story line and in the end is essentially another supporting character. Corddry is the ostensible lead but his character functions better on the outside.

I was hoping this would be hilarious (it was originally slated for a Christmas release) but it simply isn’t funny enough. It’s decently entertaining but little more which I suppose is fine for this time of year but definitely makes me yearn for a few months hence when we’ll start to see a better caliber of movie from the studios. For now, this will have to do.

REASONS TO GO: Some sly time travel movie in-jokes. Funny in places.
REASONS TO STAY: Not funny enough. Doesn’t really build on the first movie. Needed a lead character; more of a collection of supporting characters.
FAMILY VALUES: The humor is fairly crude throughout with plenty of sexual references. There’s also some graphic nudity, drug use and foul language as well.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: John Cusack, who starred in the first film, has said in interviews that he was never approached or received an offer to appear in this film; there are photographs of him that appear in one scene.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 2/24/15: Rotten Tomatoes: 13% positive reviews. Metacritic: 30/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Click
FINAL RATING: 5/10
NEXT: Wish Me Away

New Releases for the Week of February 20, 2015

THE DUFF

(CBS) Mae Whitman, Robbie Amell, Bella Thorne, Bianca A. Santos, Skyler Samuels, Romany Malco, Nick Eversman, Ken Jeong, Allison Janney. Directed by Ari Sandel

A young high school senior who is pretty content about her position in the school’s social hierarchy is shocked to discover that she’s better known around campus as the DUFF – Designated Ugly Fat Friend. Working to rehabilitate her image with a slick but charming football player, she takes on the school’s official designator of labels (doesn’t every school have one?) to find that the only label that’s important is the one you give yourself. Or something along those lines.

See the trailer, clips, interviews and B-roll video here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard (opens Thursday)
Genre: Teen Comedy
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG-13 (for crude and sexual material throughout, some language and teen partying)

Hot Tub Time Machine 2

(Paramount/MGM) Rob Corddry, Adam Scott, Chevy Chase, Craig Robinson. Having used the Hot Tub Time Machine to make their lives better, the three buddies find that using the time machine for their own purposes has a cost of its own.

See the trailer, clips, interviews, a promo and B-roll video here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Sci-Fi Comedy
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for crude sexual content and language throughout, graphic nudity, drug use and some violence)

McFarland USA

(Disney) Kevin Costner, Maria Bello, Morgan Saylor, Vincent Martella. In a Central California high school mostly made up of the children of Hispanic farm workers, school and work in the fields are all any of them have to look forward to. However, some of them are fast – that attracts the attention of new PE coach Jim White who proposes to establish a cross country team. The group’s devotion to family, incredible work ethic and belief in one another will take a little known farming community high school and transform it into a place of champions.

See the trailer, clips, interviews, a featurette and B-roll video here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: True Sports Drama
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG (for thematic material, some violence and language)

National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation

Norman Rockwell or Norman Bates?

(1989) Holiday Comedy (Warner Brothers) Chevy Chase, Beverly D’Angelo, Juliette Lewis, Johnny Galecki, John Randolph, Diane Ladd, E.G. Marshall, Doris Roberts, Randy Quaid, Miriam Flynn, Cody Burger, Ellen Hamilton Latzen, William Hickey, Nicholas Guest, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Brian Doyle-Murray, Mae Questel, Natalia Nogulich, Nicolette Scorsese. Directed by Jeremiah S. Chechnik

We all have our ideas of what an ideal Christmas is – snow on the ground or fun in the sun. Most of our ideals however involve being surrounded by family. There’s nothing quite like a traditional family Christmas.

Clark Griswold (Chase) believes that with all his heart. He has become reasonably successful and provides well for his wife Ellen (D’Angelo), his daughter Audrey (Lewis) and his son Rusty (Galecki – yes that one). His gift to the family is a swimming pool and although the ground is too hard to start digging, he needs to put the deposit down for it before Christmas. He’s counting on his bonus at work to pay that bonus but it is late in arriving.

Clark is planning on having all the grandparents at his place this year – his own parents Clark Sr. (Randolph) and Nora (Ladd) as well as Ellen’s mom (Roberts) and dad (Marshall). Naturally the two sets of parents take to ceaseless bickering.

Add to the mix the unexpected arrival of cousin Eddie (Quaid) and his family in a dilapidated RV which it turns out the family is living in after Eddie lost his job and was forced to sell the family home. Clark offers to buy cousin Eddie’s Christmas presents this year which Eddie gratefully expects. With senile Aunt Bethany (Questel) and crotchety Uncle Lewis (Hickey), things descend into utter chaos.

With nothing going right, Clark loses it a little bit – all right, he loses it a lot, especially when he finds out that his bonus isn’t what he thought it was going to be. Power grids will be overloaded, sleds will fly as will flaming Santas and sewage will explode before Christmas comes to town.

The third movie in the Vacation franchise broke with formula a little bit. For one thing, the Griswolds weren’t fish out of water in some unfamiliar place – they were in their home base which was being invaded by others. Legendary director John Hughes wrote the screenplay based on his own short story which had been published in National Lampoon (the first movie in the franchise was also based on a short story in National Lampoon). Quite frankly this wasn’t his shining hour.

And yet it was a cut above the odious National Lampoon’s European Vacation. There are some terrifically funny moments (like Clark’s sled ride from hell) but not enough of them. However the funny moments are so hilarious it kind of makes up for it. There’s also a heartwarming element that’s present in most of the other Vacations but more so here than in any of the others.

There are those that consider this a “classic” Christmas movie. I wouldn’t quite go that far but it certainly is one of the more popular ones from the 80s. By this point in his career I was finding Chase less funny than he had been during his SNL days (and I think most people agree) and certainly less funny than he’d been in Caddyshack. Still while the Griswolds weren’t particularly subversive, they did strike a chord with the American public and for many people of a certain generation this is required Yuletide viewing. To each their own.

WHY RENT THIS: When it’s funny, it’s funny.

WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: It’s not funny often enough.

FAMILY VALUES:  Some rude humor and sexuality, more than a bit of bad language and comic violence.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: This would be Mae Questel’s final film. She is best known as the voice of Betty Boop.

NOTABLE HOME VIDEO EXTRAS: The Ultimate Collector’s Edition comes in a Christmas tin with a Santa hat, coasters, an “I Survived a Griswold Family Christmas” button and a plastic cup. While no longer available in stores, you might try picking one up on E-Bay or Amazon. Otherwise you’ll just have to make do with the standard Blu-Ray or DVD which have the same features as this more expensive edition.

BOX OFFICE PERFORMANCE: $71.3M on a $25M production budget.

COMPARISON SHOPPING: Christmas With the Kranks

FINAL RATING: 5/10

NEXT: More of The Holly and The Quill!