Review: Motherless Brooklyn

Motherless Brooklyn
Cert: 15 / 144 mins / Dir. Edward Norton / Trailer



Adapting Jonathan Lethem's 1999 novel, Edward Norton produces, screen-writes and directs a tale of secrets and lies in 1957 New York. Starring as Lionel - assistant to private-eye Frank Minna (Bruce Willis) and fighting to keep his Tourette Syndrome under control - the murder of his boss sees our aspiring sleuth drawn into a city-wide bureaucratic conspiracy*¹. When Laura (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) vocally protests against property developer Moses Randolph (Alec Baldwin), Lionel becomes involved believing this to be linked to Frank's death. The pair are then surprised to receive help from architect Paul (Willem Dafoe), and the plot thickens...

MODEL

Credit where it's due for the guy doing a bit of A Dennis Waterman, Norton is a model of restraint here. Although his character's affliction comes and goes depending on his stress and distraction-levels, it would be easy to over-egg this part yet Edward rarely strays that close. Alec Baldwin is a bit more pantomime in his (metaphorical) moustache-twirling role, but Willem Dafoe brings things back to level with a 'focused' performance which channels a gaunt Brian Blessed.

Cinematographer Dick Pope's camera direction and colour palette are somehow dynamic and soporific in equal measure, bringing a soothing buzz to the intrigue of the story, while Daniel Pemberton and Wynton Marsalis' soundtrack work is outstanding, a character in and of itself; the whole thing is of its time without becoming a caricature of jazz.

PEOPLE

The plot is as convoluted as a private eye conspiracy tale needs to be, but always makes sense in context of itself. Similarly, the finish is quieter than the long lead-up might suggest although it's ultimately in-keeping with the themes of right, wrong and just making the best of a bad situation.

Motherless Brooklyn is too story-driven to be strictly a character piece, yet Norton's central performance is turned up too high to let the narrative take the lead. As such, it's unclear where this will sit in the future.

It's good, though. Watch it for the soundtrack alone.

Think Sin City, filtered through Inside Llewyn Davis.



Only if you're enthused/intrigued beforehand.



It is.



Probably not, if only because it's a cast who have been so strong elsewhere.



Unlikely.



There isn't.



Level 2: Ethan Suplee is in this, and he was in that episode of My Name Is Earl with John 'Durant' Favreau.

(although special shoutout to Michael Kenneth Wiliams who was supposed to have been in Solo, which would have made this a level-1).





*¹ Having not read the 1999 novel, I don't know how closely Norton has adapted it for the 2019 screen, so I don't know how much of the glaring Tr*mp subtext has been trowelled onto this movie by me, the viewer. Let's just say that if the openly racist property developer and megalomaniac had bleach-blond hair, it would be simultaneously over-the-top yet entirely in keeping...
^{[ BACK ]}

DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.

Review: Blockers

Blockers
Cert: 15 / 102 mins / Dir. Kay Cannon / Trailer

EXT. NIGHT.
On an otherwise deserted country-road, three concerned parents stand 15-20 feet away from their upturned car.
Mid conversation, the car explodes unexpectedly.

THE LESLIE MANN CHARACTER (screaming):
The car just exploded!

Yes, welcome to Blockers, the new R-rated comedy from Universal in which three slightly-fusty parents go out of their way to stop their teenage girls having 'fun' on their prom-night - an act which inadvertently expands to include the audience, as well. Hoping that those watching are fans of movies like Hall Pass and This is 40, but without remembering enough of those to make any direct comparison, Kay Cannon's film pitches Leslie Mann, Ike Barinholtz and John Cena as the blinkered over-protectors, against Kathryn Newton, Gideon Adlon and Geraldine Viswanathan, trying desperately to lose their respective virginities.

Whether it's because a) I'm not a parent to a teenage girl, b) I've never been a teenage girl, or c) I've seen almost every gag here done elsewhere and far better, I'm clearly not the target audience for this. Is "adults comedically decoding emoji" where we are in 2018? Who is Blockers for, demographically? Is it teenagers who want to see him from off of Midnight Caller padding naked around the house in some excruciating sex-game? Or adults who want to go and watch a comedy about three teenage girls trying to get laid? Neither seems convincing, while each explains the relative silence in screen 4 this evening - until a slightly portly chauffeur goes to do an action-roll over the bonnet of his car and ends up falling on the ground. Fat Man Falling Over™. That made them laugh.

Mann and Barinholtz act like two people at the Team Apatow reunion party who haven't moved on to bigger projects, while John Cena effortlessly demonstrates why he's the guy the studios phone when the budget won't stretch to Dwayne Johnson. Their teenage charges fare a little better in their own awkwardly charming way, albeit one which signposts that the roles have been written by two middle-aged men. As a gender-flipped Superbad, the film might have been worth making if the parents were strictly minor-characters. But without those same adults to telegraph and explain every joke in the script, the film wouldn't serve Universal's purpose.

Credit where it's due: I smiled three or four times in the last hour. But I don't know if that's because the script had started to pick up, or some kind of cinematic Stockholm Syndrome was kicking in…

There's a bit in Blockers where six teenagers in the back of a prom-limo are screaming and projectile-vomiting in time to The Marriage of Figaro. This is a crystallisation of the whole film.

This is like someone's taken Superbad*¹ and put it in a blender with Sex Tape and Bad Moms, then boiled it for long enough to remove all the jokes.



It's not.



Stream it, tops.



It's not.



That depends on how wrong you are.



There isn't.



Level 2: Leslie Mann's in this, and she was in that Knocked Up, alongside Alan 'K-2SO' Tudyk and Bill 'BB-8' Hader.





*¹ Which, when you consider that the writers of Superbad, Evan Goldberg and Seth Rogen, are producers on Blockers, is not so much a compliment as a staggering lack of self-awareness. ^{[ BACK ]}

DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.

Review: How To Be Single

How To Be Single
Cert: 15 / 110 mins / Dir. Christian Ditter / Trailer



Whilst being carpet-bombed with products and services for GIRL-THINGS™ for 27 minutes prior to the film, I watched the trailer for The Choice, the upcoming movie based on the Nicholas Sparks novel of the same name. As the promo-reel served not so much as an enticement for the film, but basically the entire thing in a truncated 3-minute form, I found myself thinking "hang on, this looks remarkably like the last trailer for a Nicholas Sparks adaptation I saw. And the one before that. And the one before…" At that moment I realised pretty much exactly how tonight's target-demographic feels when they sit through a trailer for a superhero movie. Just as I wasn't buying the clichéd horseshit about sanding down boats and going for long walks with dogs under emotionally turbulent skies etc, these fine cinemagoers around me don't think "Hey, I like the way they've adapted Iron Man's armour for the new movie; it really evokes the silver-age without being too retro!". Seriously ladies, I can tune out the odd TV and billboard advert that I know isn't aimed at me, but after being force-fed for half an hour the bullshit you're exposed to constantly? I genuinely have no idea how you manage to live in this world full-time. I salute you.

Which is more than Warner Brothers are doing in their cinematic interpretation of How To Be Single, a film which is every bit as patronising and methodical as you'd expect (and, I suspect, as was intended). Recycled chick-flick tropes fill the gaps left by the borderline-incoherent storytelling and erratic editing. Nowhere near as provocative or hedonistic as it'd like to think it is, but thoroughly unable to commit to being contemplative (or even mawkish), either.

At its best, How To Be Single is faintly amusing, if facile and self-indulgent. At its worst, the film is like being waterboarded with Lambrini, your gurgled screams drowned out by a Cosmopolitan-compiled playlist. That the script goes so far as to dismissively reference both Bridget Jones and Sex & The City shows just how far above its station the film's ideas are. The cast give good value for money as far as they're able, but they're hobbled by a format which objectifies and belittles them far more than the society it's cocking a snook at. The Insecure one, the Mumsy one, the Needy one and the Fat one*¹. You can go out and party as much as you like, girls! As long as you conform while you're doing it. Well played, Warner Brothers, well played.

Oh, and take a good look at that poster. It's the only time you'll see those four actresses in the same room. I'd initially wondered why the IMDB page for the film lists Alison Brie far, far apart from the other stars (in the Rest of cast listed alphabetically section), especially as it's apparently in 'credits-order'. This is because while Brie's character and Dakota Johnson's character share a mutual friend, Alison's story-thread has not-fuck-nothing to do with the rest of the film. It feels like some side-anecdote which the movie keeps forgetting to tell or wasn't edited out properly.
Bizarre, unfocused and every bit as slapdash as the rest of the production...

"Maybe we're been making all the wrong moves? Maybe we've been focusing on the wrong stuff and now it's too late..?" says Johnson's Alice in a third-act moment of realisation.

I imagine the editing-team remarked much the same thing, just before they handed in their final cut of the film…

Being patronised by film studios suggesting your love-life (or lack thereof) is somehow not dramatic enough.



It's not really designed for that format, to be fair.



Well I didn't utterly despise the film, despite its best efforts, so no.



I should hope not.



A little bit.
I mean, probably not a lot.
But yes.



There isn't.



Level 2: Rebel Wilson is due to appear in the upcoming Absolutely Fabulous: The Movie alongside Celia 'Bravo 5' Imrie and Gwendoline 'Phasma' Christie.







*¹ I like Rebel Wilson. I want to like her more, I really do. But her ongoing choice of roles is frankly atrocious.
Take a long look in the mirror, Rebel. Or just watch Grimsby. Either/or.

DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.

Review: Vacation

Vacation
Cert: 15 / 99 mins / Dir. John Francis Daley / Trailer



Well, there's a turn-up. The trailer for Warner Bros' retooling of the National Lampoons' Vacation franchise has been played to death in recent weeks, and it did less to boost my confidence with each re-watch. That the movie has had a right kicking from reviewers in the US didn't help either, so I braced myself for the worst as I sat down for a preview-showing. I mean, I've seen worse in the last month, right?

Well actually, yes. Sure, the minimalistically rebranded Vacation isn't quite as sweet-natured or nostalgic as it'd like to think it is, the gross-out moments aren't as subversive or anarchic as they probably felt in the script-meetings, and the references and in-jokes to the earlier films aren't as clever or subtle as the screenwriters had hoped. But the film more than passed the laugh-test. The chemistry of Ed Helms, Christina Applegate, Skyler Grisondo and Steele Stebbins papers over the cracks and makes for a consistently amusing series of interlinked sketches (which is no more or less than what these movies are intended to be, to be fair).

I laughed, the audience laughed, the film went down very well. Tellingly, most of the gags from the trailer fell a little flat, probably as a result of repeated exposure in recent weeks, so the film's going to be funniest the first time you see it (although the plastic-bag joke worked just as well, probably because it's longer and even more sadistic in the film). Vacation doesn't get too misty-eyed for the past, littered with more than its fair share of bad language and questionable subject matter, but by the same token, it never forgets that it's a film about the Griswold family. And just when you think Chris Hemsworth has overplayed his comedic hand a little, Chevy Chase is wheeled out for a few scenes in the final act and threatens to derail the entire thing. He's not awful (and obviously deserves a place at the table) but his performance is, to put it politely, batshit.

Far better than it has any real right to be, Vacation mixes the farce of The Griswolds with the faeces of The Hangover and just about gets away with it. This time.

Against my wiser instincts, I rather enjoyed it.
Don't tell anyone.

I'm not sure I'd go that far…



This is a DVD with some friends and a few drinks. It won't be a bad movie to have on the shelf, but don't buy it until the price drops.



Again, not sure I'd go that far, although Skyler Gisondo and Steele Stebbins steal the show as the squabbling Griswold kids.



Be an entertaining, disposable Summer comedy? Yes.
Reinvigorate the Vacation franchise for another run of movies? …I'm not sure I'd go that far.



Not at all.



There isn't.



The film features Chris 'Thor' Hemsworth who was in the Avengers movies, of course, with Sam 'Windu' Jackson.







DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.

Review: The Other Woman

The Other Woman
Cert: 12A / 109 mins / Dir. Nick Cassavetes




There are a few scenes in the opening act of Nick Cassavetes's new film where an emotionally stunned Leslie Mann ghosts around Greenwich Village with a glassy-eyed layer of disquieting melancholy, bringing to mind the classic work of Woody Allen, and the actress's hyperbolic performance backs this up, suggesting that a revealing, introspective movie may have been mis-sold in the trailer as a raucous Feminist-Lite™ comedy. This is soon forgotten, however, when we get a shot of a dog defecating on an apartment floor, and enough oestrogen-fuelled screeching to make us feel like we're trapped in a lift hurtling in free-fall toward the ground floor, with six different episodes of Loose Women playing on each surface at top volume...

Oh, not all the time, I should add that. But definitely some of the time. The script pulls some of the trailer's punches by having the 'reveal' of Nasty-Cheating-Man*¹ be non-existent, and by letting the whole thing drag on for around 20 minutes too many, but all in all it's reasonably well done. I've seen two of the three leads in far worse, put it that way. Cameron Diaz and Kate Upton do well but seem frustrated in their roles as sassy-litigator and beach-bimbo, respectively, and everyone outside of the main trio of lead characters is purely cardboard; this really is Leslie Mann's film (even if some of her ad-libs do go on for 30 seconds longer than they're funny), and I'd like to see her in something weightier, if only to break her cycle of slighly-below-par-comedies.

The film just about scrapes though the laugh-test, but it'll be undemanding fluff at best, even for its target demographic. You've seen better, but you've seen way worse.

Oh, and it's official, now. Don Johnson and Trevor Eve have become the same swaggering, middle-aged, Blue Stratos wearing Lotharioid-Mechanism…


(Actually, that comparison doesn't really do it justice. You'll have to trust me, they are the same thing, now.)

Considering how much this isn't aimed at me, I found The Other Woman reassuringly watchable, although at the same time it's still thoroughly pedestrian and exactly what I was expecting. Some solid performances bolster a shaky screenplay based on a tried-and-tested premise. Come for Kate Upton; Stay for Leslie Mann.

The trailer's a bit snappier, if anything.



Mostly, but I winced quite a lot, too.



Oh, probably.



This is a £3 DVD and ooh look, the Lambrini's on 2 for £5*².



No.



Not unless it's on at someone's house and I'm feeling too polite*³ to berate them.



There isn't.

I've never seen Nicki Minaj before. No, seriously. Is that actually her for real, or was it a comedic tribute to the late, great Kenny Everett?

*¹ I watched a film about him for almost two hours and I don't know his name. His character was so unmemorable that I don't know his name. No, I won't look it up, why should the writer Melissa Stack get away with it that easily? The leads are Kate, Carly and Amber. He is 'the nasty man'. As opposed to 'the good man', whose name I also can't remember, but he's an incidental decorator, so yeah.
*² Which tells you, I hope, everything I know about Lambrini. If 2-for-£5 is an realistic special-offer price, then I would like to point out that it was complete guesswork on my part. I do look for tramp-deals, but in the brown-beer department. Honest. Your Honour.
*³ Drunk.

DISCLAIMERS:
• ^^^ That's dry, British humour, and most likely sarcasm or facetiousness.
• Yen's blog contains harsh language and even harsher notions of propriety. Reader discretion is advised.
• This is a personal blog. The views and opinions expressed here represent my own thoughts (at the time of writing) and not those of the people, institutions or organisations that I may or may not be related with unless stated explicitly.