Monthly Archives: November 2013

Christmas Catch

Mack (Emily Alatalo) is a police detective working for her “call me Captain” mother (Lauren Holly) in a small town precinct (quite probably its only one). Mack is notorious on the force, and particularly with her ~~mother~~ Captain, for being socially awkward and completely hopeless when it comes to dating. We are treated to several examples and yes, they are painful. But you know how it goes: when you’re least expecting it, you run into a handsome man, things just click, and the rest is history. With the right man, and Carson (Franco Lo Presti) certainly has Mr. Right chiseled down that perfect jawline, everything seems easy.

Except for when Special Agent Robertson (Genelle Williams) of the FBI shows up the next day, explaining that Carson is a suspected diamond thief (a 3 million dollar diamond reindeer to be exact) and needs to be surveilled – by none other than Mack and her partner (Andrew Bushell) of course. Why are the good ones always either gay or diamond thieves? Still crushing on the perp hard, Mack vows to remain impartial and professional, and even tries not to drool when surveillance just happens to include Carson in a barely-there towel. Things get sticker when Agent Robertson orders Mack to “pretend” to date Carson in order to get closer to him, win his trust, and have him confess. Can Mack possibly do her job without falling hopelessly in love?

No she can’t. But if you’ve always thought romantic Hallmark holiday movies could be improved with some sort of crime aspect, this one’s sure to be right up your alley.

Dashing Through The Snow

1 Reply

Ashley (Meghan Ory) is on her way home for the holidays when her flight is cancelled and the last rental car is rudely rented right from under her nose by a pushy, entitled nogoodnik named Dash (ugh) (Andrew W. Walker). Still, beggars can’t be choosers and Ashley’s desperate to get home in time for Christmas, so she accepts a ride from her brand new nemesis (stranger danger, Ashley!).

As if their first impression wasn’t bad enough, the two quickly find that they are complete opposites now stuck in a teeny tiny vehicle on a mad two-day dash to get from Sacramento to Seattle. Ashley is sunny and bubbly and despite Dash’s curmudgeonly attempts to rain on her parade, her brightness persists, and persists in annoying the heck out of him (honestly, she would be a lot to take during this type of road trip). Now, the sensible thing to do would be to spell each other in the driver’s seat while the other naps, eats, and plans their route. Are these two sensible? Of course not. But it wouldn’t be a holiday Hallmark movie if they weren’t stopping at diners to help decorate trees, or randomly adopting puppies from bikers, now would it? (Actually….)

And then there’s the tail. Yeah, did I mention the feds are after Ashley? That’s why she couldn’t get on her plane, she’s on the no-fly unbeknownst to her, suspected of being a home grown radicalized terrorist! Which seems like it must be a big mistake with some perfectly logical explanation, except…what’s in that big red box she’s been carrying around, and what is her rush to get to Seattle, exactly? So maybe our girl’s just a teeny bit suspicious. But what Ashley and Dash don’t know can’t hurt them, so they’re just obliviously driving along, snacking on pork rinds or whatever disgusting foods Americans eat in their cars, and falling just a bit in love. Or a lot in love, according to Ashley, who cries it to her mother when she finally gets to see her. In love! After a 36 hour car ride, during most of which at least one of them hated the other. For goodness sake, Ashley, have some self respect!

Cranberry Christmas

1 Reply

In a slight detour from the usual Hallmark formula, Dawn (Nikki DeLoach) and Gabe (Benjamin Ayres) are already married. In fact, they’re already separated. Well, they’re “taking some time apart” as Gabe stays on the cranberry farm , ensuring its proper management, and Dawn travels the world promoting their lifestyle brand and business, Cranberry Lane. Dawn returns home in time for the holidays to help out with the town’s annual Christmas festival, with a huge talk show host, Pamela (Marci T. House), in tow. She’s proposing to feature them on her show, a huge get for Cranberry Lane, obviously, but pretty awkward since the planned segments would focus on Dawn and Gabe as the perfect Christmas couple. They agree that for the business’ sake they will pose as a happy couple for as long as the TV show’s around, but nobody’s fooled into thinking it will be easy.

Honestly, it won’t be nearly as difficult as they think. There isn’t a lack of love between Dawn and Gabe, but their lives are taking them down different paths and they’ve been growing apart. Of course, acting like a cozy couple kind of gets their romantic juices flowing again. They’ve still got their issues but they seem willing to work on things – until Pamela throws a much bigger wrench into things. Their segments have gone so swimmingly (shall I say sleddingly since it’s Christmas?) that Pamela (think Oprah, she’s apparently that big) is offering them their own national TV show…which would require them to move to NYC, where it tapes. Gabe has recently poured more of himself into the farm, and bought more land, to expand. He’s committed at home, not interested in TV shows or moving. He’s actually ready to step away from Cranberry Lane altogether. Pamela is willing to take Dawn on her own, and it’s an amazing opportunity, and neither of them wants Gabe to stand in the way of her dreams.

Cranberry Christmas is refreshing for its variation on the Hallmark theme, and truly, the falling in love part is the easy part, isn’t it? It’s the staying in love that can be a challenge: growing together, sharing a life, making the compromises. Marriage is hard work, and this is a rare Hallmark romance that admits that love and commitment come with bumps in the road. Hallmark movies ask you to buy into a certain romantic fantasy, but a movie like this helps normalize the truth of real relationships. The beginning of a relationship is easy to get right; it’s the considerable territory between ‘I do’ and death parting you that really matters, and while it may not be the passionate, feet-sweeping good times of the falling in love part, the heart-warming, soul-expanding, truly knowing another person and relying on their steadfastness middle that makes love the most sought-after of things.

How Many Oscar Winners Does it Take to Save a Piece of Shit?

2 Replies

The Big Wedding stars FOUR Oscar winners: Robert DeNiro, Diane Keaton, Susan Sarandon, and Robin Williams.

So the answer to the question is: at least 5. It takes at least 5 Oscar winners to save a piece of shit; four were definitely not enough.

The premise: a long-divorced couple (Keaton & DeNiro) have to pretend to still be married on the occasion of their adopted son’s wedding (Ben Barnes, white guy, not remotely Columbian, to Amanda Seyfried), to keep up appearances in front of his religious biological mother, who is visiting all the way from – you guessed it – Columbia.

Flimsy? You bet. It’s exactly the kind of role I hate to see Diane Keaton doing these days, and now she’s dragging Susan Sarandon down along with her (playing her former best friend and current flame of the ex-husband). Ladies at this stage in their career should not have to resort to slapstick.

Topher Grace and Katherine Heigl round out the cast as the two other unlucky-in-love kids, heaping contrived subplot onto contrived subplot. And then Robin Williams shows up as the drunk but devout Catholic priest who’s set to marry these two crazy kids, despite the racist protests of a soon-to-be in-law unfortunately named Muffin (beige grandbabies alert!). Um, haven’t we seen Robin play this exact thing before?

Anyway, you won’t think this movie is good, but if you’re in the right mood – like, in bed with a bad head cold, for example – you might find it…passable. Like, if it’s playing on TV and you can’t find the remote, you could do worse. And maybe you just need a little schmaltz in your life: nothing wrong with that. Don’t admit to it, maybe, but enjoy it with a bowl of popcorn, or maybe melty ice cream, because let’s face it: the movie itself is cheesy enough to clog your precious arteries.

This Means War

1 Reply

I’m not usually one for guilty pleasures; I take a lot of pleasure, and feel very little guilt. But there’s just something about this movie that makes me a) like it, and b) feel bad about liking it.

It’s a romance. There, I said it. It’s an unconventional romance, but still. Reese Witherspoon, who does little to lend the film credibility, plays a product testing executive who loves her job which leaves little time for anything else. But her crazy friend Chelsea Handler signs her up to an online dating site and by the next morning she’s dating not one but two very handsome, very eligible bachelors.

Bachelor #1: a devoted single father, hard-working Tom Hardy. Polite, romantic, safe, sweet.

Bachelor #2: ladies’ man, man about town Chris Pine. Knows all the right movies, uses them liberally.

The catch (there’s always a catch): the two suitors are actually best friends. And also, they’re both CIA.

So when they decide to date her concurrently so that she may pick between them, they of course go off the chain on security details, intel, the works. It’s like dating on steroids – and yet, idiotically, she never notices.

Predictably, she likes them both. And is also overheard reporting on their flaws: Chris Pine’s tiny hands, Tom Hardy’s being, unforgivably, British.

But there’s a charming chemistry between all 3 of them – perhaps most convincingly between the two men (now there’s a movie I’d never feel guilty about loving!). And Chelsea Handler keeps popping up to offer vulgar advice, injecting a Reese Witherspoon movie with a little more edge than usual.

McG’s work is clumsy, but the movie is fun and breezy and a tiny departure from the norm. But really, let’s be honest: Tom Hardy. It’s really just a straight hour and a half of Tom Hardy gazing, with just enough bombs and bullets that, if you’re lucky, your husband won’t even notice what you’re up to.

The Rooftop Christmas Tree

Christmas Homecoming

1 Reply

Amanda (Julie Benz), a widowed army wife, is facing her second Christmas alone and still can’t bring herself to decorate for the season during which she lost her husband. Now she’s on the verge of losing her job at the local history museum too, unless her brilliant fundraising plan can save the day – and honestly what are the chances of that happening, and with such a tight deadline?

Good thing she’s recently taken on a tenant, Master Sergeant Jim Mullins (Michael Shanks), who’ll be staying just long enough to heal his broken leg. For reasons unknown to us, Jim is a very big fan of Christmas and the first thing he does is string up lights around his shabby little apartment, after which he immediately begins wildly overstepping. Perhaps he’s unused to idle hands, but he starts playing Mr. Fix It around the house without Amanda’s permission or knowledge, even tinkering with a vintage motorcycle he knows belonged to Amanda’s dead husband, which should have rendered it not only off-limits and sacrosanct. This is the same woman, after all, who still can’t delete her late husband’s last voice mail or throw out even his ugliest bowling shirt.

Slowly but surely, the two begin to heal together – and yes, to even the playing field, Jim does have something more to heal than just his dumb leg. With broken hearts on the mend, love is perhaps not as impossible as it once seemed, but widows are a tough nut to crack. It is much harder to move on from a love that never ran its course, and it’s hard to be compared to a sainted man who died a hero. And yet Jim decides to make things even harder on them by re-enlisting. Sure the retention bonus allows for a grand gesture, but do you think Amanda wants to risk her heart in Afghanistan again?

Hallmark is no stranger to depictions of Christmas for the military family but this year have specifically partnered with the United Service Organizations (USO), the nation’s leading organization to serve the men and women in the U.S. military and their families. This partnership aims to raise awareness about the needs of the military community, honouring the service and sacrifice of the Armed Forces, bringing cheer to military families and encouraging the American public to express gratitude for our men and women in uniform.

Truth or Dare

2 Replies

During Madonna’s 1990 Blonde Ambition tour, she was filmed nearly constantly and the footage was strung together to make this behind the scenes documentary. At the time it was both lauded and condemned for being wild (she exposes her breasts!) and lewd (a gay kiss!). 25 years and a whole lotta Madonna later it almost seems whimsical but it still works as a nostalgia piece.

In fact, watching Truth or Dare, I can’t decide what lights up my nostalgia more – the costumes, or the dance moves. And it definitely makes me wonder how Madonna feels about them looking back. If you were a fan of Sex and the City, you may remember a certain episode towards the end where Carrie was tasked with cleaning out her closet. She tries on various costumes that fans recognized instantly from the series, while her friends yayed or nayed them. It was a perfect send-up to the whole era of SATC but should Madonna do the same I think the whole world might implode. Of course we all remember the cone-bras and that’s something that doesn’t really age because it’s iconic. The bustier layered on top of wide-legged trousers, however, feel like a much bigger mistake in retrospect, but one I’m glad to relive (as long as she’s the one caught on camera wearing it!).

There’s also a fair bit of celebrity gossip on hand because Madonna was of course dating (and breaking up with) Warren Beatty at the time. Beatty is definitely not fond of the constant cameras and you’ve got to wonder if they weren’t partially responsible for their parting (although Madonna’s hectic schedule and near-constant touring when health permits can’t have been easy either). Despite it being Warren in the picture, when Madonna is asked who the love of her life has been, she names Sean [Penn]. How much would you wager she’d answer the same today? Madonna herself doesn’t seem to court a lot of celebrity friends and she’s much too busy working to be out partying. A fair number do stop by to watch her concert and bump fists with her afterward, and the best cameo goes to Kevin Costner – no, to Kevin Costner’s mullet – who proves he’s beyond square by calling her show “neat” and acting rather bored.

Instead of partying, she stays in to baby her failing voice, and is often cuddled up with her dancers, decked out in fluffy hotel bathrobes. She and her dancers grow quite close during the tour, and she often talks about an intense mothering instinct that’s brought out in her. She ‘s only 32 or so, not so very much older than the dances, but in experience she’s already ancient.

There are lots of terrific Madonna moments, from being threatened with arrest for “indecency” at her Toronto Skydome concert, to reminding God that “she’s here” should he need her services during a pre-show group prayer.

I watched this as a companion piece to a more recent documentary called Strike A Pose – catching up with the dancers made famous by this documentary and her Blonde Ambition tour. Both are worth checking out, although Truth or Dare is clearly the classic.

The Road Within

3 Replies

Oh man. If you watch one questionable movie (Welcome to Me), Netflix immediately believes the worst in you and starts recommending movies for the hidden loser in all of us. I assume this is what led me to watch something as painful and thoughtless as The Road Within.

First, that smarmy title. If it sounds like a non-selling self-help book, maybe leave it at that.

So the formulaic story is this: three young adults find themselves at a treatment centre under the care of Kyra Sedgwick for their various ailments. So they steal her car and go on an oddball road trip while the good doctor apparently abandons all other patients in order to search for them.

Vincent (Robert Sheehan) has severe Tourette’s – he tics and swears his way through this film; Marie (Zoe Kravitz) is painfully thin and painfully anorexic; Alex (Dev Patel) is as OCD (obsessive-compulsive, emphasis on obsessive) as they come. Though competently acted, I often felt their afflictions teetered on being played for laughs, and this set me on edge for the duration of the film.

Writer-director Gren Wells is remaking a 2010 German film, Vincent Wants to Sea, which is slightly better but didn’t exactly scream to be remade. The thing that kills me is that lots of real-life people live with these diseases, and they tend to do it with a lot more grace than this movie possesses. How does it both trivialize and make a mockery of these afflictions? And why are their characters allowed to be completely defined – and even overwhelmed – by their respective challenges? Because none of them seems to have a personality. They just have illness. And that rings false.

It seems to want to avoid the sentimental ending but can’t quite resist. The trio of young actors do pretty impressive jobs considering the patronizing material they’re wrestling with, but it’s not enough to uplift the movie or to make me feel comfortable with the way it treats some pretty serious issues.

One good thing I’ll mention in regards to this movie:

REELABILITIES hosted a special screening of the movie in April 2015, which was attended by Dr. Danielle Sheypuk. REELABILITIES is a film festival dedicated to promoting awareness and appreciation of the lives, stories, and artistic expressions of people with different disabilities, which is a beautiful idea and a cause near and dear to my heart.

Danielle Sheypuk, if you don’t know her, is a ground-breaking busy-body: a licensed psychologist, media commentator, disability-rights advocate and fashion model. She’s also worn the crown of Miss Wheelchair New York and was the first woman in a wheel chair to grace the catwalk at New York fashion week, February 2014 (a year later, fashion house Carrie Hammer tapped American Horror Story Jamie Brewer to walk their show, marking the first woman with Down syndrome to appear at fashion week). Dr. Sheypuk specializes in the problems of dating, relationships and sexuality among the disabled, a necessary but taboo subject I’ll be covering in my upcoming review of The Sessions.

Smoke

5 Replies

Harvey Keitel plays Auggie Wren, the owner of a neighbourhood smoke shop. One of his most loyal customers is writer Paul Benjamin (William Hurt), a man so clouded in pain that he nearly walks into traffic, saved at the last minute by a kid on the street, Rashid, played by a very young Harold Perrineau. All three of them spend the movie telling various stories, with flexible degrees of reality to them. Truth pales in comparison to an aesthetically pleasing story. The satisfaction in telling these stories is what’s important.

Rashid claims he’s hiding from a gang, but he’s really searching for the father who disappeared from his life years ago (Forest Whittaker, who is only 2 years older than Perrineau, and who wears the world’s worst prosthetic during the film – seriously, people, the fake arm is so absurdly long, we know he’s hiding a perfectly functioning hand in there, and maybe a couple of apples as well!).

Auggie encounters an old flame (Stockard Channing) who tells him that he has an 18-year-old daughter(Ashley Judd), and she’s in trouble, pregnant and addicted to crack. He’s sure she can’t be his, but gets roped into a rescue mission all the same.

This movie is meant to be enjoyed the way a cigar is, appreciated in puffs and wisps at a time, taken in and held. It’s a talky movie – it’s about the art of storytelling and focuses on the everyday, so don’t expect it to “pick up.” It’s meandering. It’s not just taking its time getting somewhere, there actually is no destination.

Director Wayne Wang worked very closely with writer Paul Auster, and it shows. This is as “literary” as a movie is capable of being – any more so, and Keitel would have sat on a stool and simply read aloud from a bo smoke3 ok. The script is all meat, no gristle, and I’m sure it’s an actor’s delight. It belongs to the slow movement for sure, I’m just not sure I could bear to be part of it for much more than the film’s 112 minute running time. Keitel’s “Christmas story” toward the end of the film is a particular combination of gruelling and rewarding. Great story, but it’s just one very long take, something like 13 minutes, just Keitel’s face as he tells the story, the camera slowly closing in on it, and finally just his eyes.

And hey, if moody soliloquies don’t do it for you, there’s always this: it won an MTV movie award for best sandwich in a movie (ham and cheese). Praise be.