Because the received wisdom is that when you release a big movie for the boys, you need to put something on for the girls to watch, too. The girls who don't want to watch Henry Cavill's torso I suppose, but hey, we could easily have gotten Tina Fey shrieking through some Universal-spawned neon nightmare instead, so this film's already at least one point ahead ;)
Yes, the Portokalos family are back, louder and more intrusive than ever, as Nia and Ian's daughter Paris reaches college-age, and Nia's parents find out they were never legally married fifty years ago. So warm-hearted bickering all round, then...
As the writer producer and headlining star, Nia Vardalos' observational family material is very good (as in the first film), but the overall structure is more shambolic here than I think anyone intended. While there's a far more solid storyline this time around, procedings are still hampered by sub-plots treated as muttered asides. Set eighteen-or-so years after My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Toula and Ian are apparently in some mid-life rut according to the script, but this only illustrated by characters periodically mentioning it, rather than - y'know - acting. Toula's dad's 50-year grudge with his brother in Greece is mentioned in one scene, then resolved in less than a minute, three scenes later. Toula's cousin Angelo is revealed as gay in one scene, then his anxieties about coming out to traditionalist family are brushed away in less than a minute the next time it's referenced.
Now it'll come as no great surprise for you to learn that I didn't watch the first movie's spin-off sitcom, so I don't know if any of these more throwaway moments are tying up loose ends from that (although it's thirteen years old now and there were only seven episodes, so I'd be surprised if that's the case). This really feels like a bunch of TV episodes condensed down into a movie, and with only an hour and a half, things get slightly cluttered, and not in a 'crazy' way.
But ultimately MBFGW2 is a bit fluffy, a lot undemanding and refreshingly non-cynical without resorting to tweeness. The film spends a lot of time coasting on charm, but there are plenty of wry smiles, quite a few chuckles and a couple of good guffaws*.
The film's not going to push any boundaries or redefine the genre, but it's very comfortable in its own skin, which helps a lot. But a sequel this chronologically separated from its forebear shouldn't feel so much like filler…
Well y'know. The first one.
It won't really add any extra layer to the experience.
MBFGW2 sets its sights relatively low, so yes.
Not really.
Not really.
Not at all.
Level 2: John Corbett (yes, Ronnie's son) appeared in 2008's Street Kings, as did Mr Forest Whitaker who should be turning up somewhere in Star Wars: Rogue One later this year.
*1 Mind you, Mrs Blackout and myself were lucky enough to be seated directly in front of patrons who had evidently never seen a comedy so utterly hilarious before. Seriously, it was like being sat in a room with two haunted laugh-bags. Sometimes this would be at one of the jokes, at others it was just at one of the characters walking through a doorway (no, really). The funnier the joke, the more terrified the rest of the audience was.
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.
Oh, come on, I'm a middle-aged man that used to have hair longer than Randy 'The Ram' Robinson's. How am I supposed to concentrate on Marisa Tomei lapdancing when they're playing Firehouse over the top of it? So much of the film's 1980s soundtrack is either from my youth or my recent years playing GTA, that a film about a confused man living in the past seems less like the character study of a nostalgic narcissist and more like a secretly-filmed documentary…
Joking aside, the use of handheld cameras throughout the film does lend The Wrestler the feel of a fly-on-the-wall diary, bringing a sense of intimacy to the point of claustrophobia, particularly in the quieter scenes. It's these moments where Mickey Rourke's performance is at its strongest. The portrait of a faded pro-wrestler working the amateur circuit, The Ram is a man who can't let go of his glory days, not because he believes it to be better as such, but because he pretty much has no present to return to. Outside the ring, his existence is punctuated with links to his former life; the action figure of himself he keeps in his van, his licensed Nintendo NES game he's always got on standby ready to play in his trailer, or the collection of TDK mixtape cassettes next to his bed.
But aside from the character-building, The Wrestler is of course a film about a wrestler, and that's where we parted ways. As someone who fails to grasp any sport at even the most fundamental level, I found it difficult to give a shit about something I have absolutely no frame of reference for. The fact that pro-wrestling*1 is essentially a performance art anyway, only made things worse, not better. The lines between good acting, good wrestling and bad bit-part acting all blurred together a little too easily for me, and rapidly turned into something I just couldn't get involved with. The film is certainly well made, but I'd have been more interested if it had been an actual documentary (although again, with the notorious levels of showmanship involved in the sport, it may as well be).
Even with the scattershot subplots running into Randy's personal life, the pacing is a little too slow and disjointed for my tastes, and feels like a 70 minute film padded out for too long with b-roll footage.
Despite everything that Aronofsky skillfully throws at the viewer, I just couldn't connect with The Wrestler. Maybe I just prefer my fakery to be a little less real?
Nope. I was all poised to see it at my local cinema (it actually played there), then didn't quite get round to it for whatever reason.
Well, I'd be hard pushed to say I really 'enjoyed' The Wrestler, but it interested the fuck out of me, on film-making level.
Only if you're looking for something a little challenging that's not exactly deep, but definitely has more going on under the surface.
Didn't hear one. Although it's not that kind of movie, I suppose.
Mickey Rourke starred in 2006's Stormbreaker, as did Ewan McGregor from the Star Wars prequel trilogy and Andy Serkis from the Star Wars sequel trilogy (well, The Force Awakens at least).
*1 ie the spandex/arena type wrestling as opposed to the olympic type wrestling shown in Foxcatcher. Although to be fair I struggled to give a shit about that as well.
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.
Stand Up Guys Cert: 15 / 95 mins / Dir. Fisher Stevens
Every so often, when I rent a movie, I can tell in the first five minutes why it wasn't on at my local cinema. And it's not because they've only got five screens down there. Stand Up Guys has a soundtrack with a leaning towards Tarantino, and dearly wishes it had the script to match. Starring as two 'retired' gangsters, Pacino and Walken sleepwalk their way through a bumbling, plodding script, but at least Chris has the decency to occasionally look embarrassed at some of the lines he has to read. Things pick up at the half-hour point where Alan Arkin appears; his parts of the script are no better, but he looks like he's having more fun delivering them.
Alas it's all for nought, as the main thread of the plot (Walken's plan now that Pacino's out of prison) keeps half-arsedly floating to the surface until it can't be ignored. That aspect of the film is actually quite well executed when it's given prominence, and there's definitely the potential for this to have been a lot more introspective and thoughtful, but it's overshadowed by the film trying too hard to be a quirky black comedy (and with both Pacino and Walken, you've seen that trick so often that there's nothing new here). At times it comes across like a US version of Get Lucky. Yeah.
Oh, and if you've sound-mixed your "noisy bar" scene properly, you shouldn't be able to hear people's footsteps over the 'thumping' music, let alone the banknotes being counted off a wad by Christopher Walken. The best thing about the entire film is the gilt-framed picture of Billy Dee Williams holding a Colt-45 in that same scene.
Stand Up Guys was already on shaky ground, but it loses another point for having the sheer fucking audacity to rip-off the "chew gum / kick ass" line from They Live.
Twice.
Well, the trailer shows some of the laughs, some of the poignancy, but none of the grinding tedium.
Not nearly enough.
Not by a long shot.
This can wait till it's on the telly.
More than likely.
Less than likely.
No, but there is a boot-shot. Which is more insulting, somehow.
If the gangsters they steal the car from are so dangerous, how come they haven't noticed their car's even been stolen for the next five hours and why don't the police trace the plates and/or report the car still at large and why doesn't anyone notice a stolen fucking JCB digging a grave at 4am? Or am I not supposed to be asking questions about the actual mechanics of the actual events in the actual film?
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 'catch-up' review. I watched this film at home, not at the cinema. I saw the trailer for this at the cinema, and I would have seen the film there too, but they didn't/couldn't show it. So now iTunes, Amazon, Netflix and Blockbuster get to reap the rewards of my local's advance-advertising, and I'm sure they're delighted. Now you may say "oh come on, they can't show everything down there", and that would be a valid point if they didn't do things like running Taken 2 for six weeks. Was it that successful? No, I don't think so. Twilight? Batman? Les Mes? Sure, go for it; if they're pulling the punters in then keep making that money. But Taken 2? I ask you. Anyway, this is essentially a DVD review, but still of a new(ish) film. There. I'm glad that's sorted.
• 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.
