Mirror Mirror (2012)

PG, 1 hr. 35 min.  Directed By: Tarsem Singh.  Release Date:  Mar 30, 2012.

I decided at the last minute to see a movie today, so I made a quick trip to Fandango to find times, and ended up seeing Mirror Mirror.  I hadn’t been all that interested in seeing it once I got past the initial trailer:  I was thinking fairy tale for adults, which is something I like conceptually, but in the wake of last year’s Beastly, I figured I’d take a pass.  But, it had the winning start time and I could fit it in to the other things I had planned this evening, so I went. 

Mirror Mirror isn’t for adults.  Not quite.  The theater was absolutely FILLED with kids when I walked in about five minutes late; a thirty-something, by himself.  Every parent in the joint instantly went into red alert that I might be there for their kids, and I started swearing under my breath.  If I’d known this was a kids’ movie, I would have taken a pass, because I frigging resent like hell that glare that parents give me when I walk in to a kids’ movie.  Now, there were a lot of kids, and a lot of parents grumbling about the content.

The movie waffles back and forth between insanely juvenile and completely appropriate, making pit stops between the two extremes with the regularity of a PCP user in the grip of a seriously bad trip.  There’s violence, vocabulary that the average high school student wouldn’t necessarily know, some pretty blatant and obvious sexual references, and Julia Roberts trying (and failing) at snide.  The movie treats little people like circus freaks, making them somehow both heroes and the butt of about half the jokes in the film.  I spent a lot of time frowning and wishing I’d worn a watch so I could be looking at it.

Now, towards the end, the movie gets funny, but it is the kind of funny that you’re hoping no one will catch you enjoying.  The story follows (vaguely) the tale of Snow White, but seems to borrow heavily from other fairy tales.  I caught references to Robin Hood, and I vaguely remember thinking something else, but I’ve forgotten.  Anyhow, what happens is a story that’s a little muddled.

This is also pretty decent visually.  But it leans towards style without substance.  I wasn’t enamored of the cast, either.  Armie Hammer, who plays the handsome prince of the tale, towers (and I mean TOWERS) over the dwarves and Lily Collins as Snow White.  Roberts monotonous presentation had me wishing I had a kitten to punch, and I did kind of wonder if someone shouldn’t have working on Collins’ guybrows, but that mean streak could be blamed on the rage generated by Julia Roberts.

This isn’t a great movie.  It has endearing moments, and like I said, some great visual effects.  If you have young children, you may want to think twice about this, if for no other reason than to save yourself from having to sit through this crap.  I'm probably going to enjoy watching this tank internationally, since the rest of the world has a problem with the Disney version of Snow White, and, if you can't translate the title above, the French poster titles the movie "Snow White."

The Break-Up Artist (2009)

PG-13, 1 hr. 34 min.  Directed by: Steve Woo.   DVD Release Date: November 10, 2009.

I scratched my head about this movie for a long time before I finally came to a decision about how, exactly, I was going to review this.  It wasn’t that the movie was bad, because it was actually cute in a vague way.  Nothing I was going to get excited about, but I wasn’t rolling my eyes every fifteen minutes and looking for a barf bag the rest of the time.  I suspect that the majority of my problem was that I watched Mr. Fix It a year or so ago, which has a similar pretense, but is told from a more male perspective.  It was also a little bit better done even though that movie was a romance and this one is meant more as a romantic comedy.

As a romance, I would have gotten this.  But they failed to make it mushy enough.  The mostly female cast would have made sense as a romance.  As a romantic comedy, this fell very flat.  The only recognizable cast member (for me) was Amanda Crew, although it took me the whole film and a trip to IMDB to figure out who she was.  She HAS a comedy background, and I’ve actually enjoyed most of her work to date, but there was nothing funny about this movie.  There wasn’t, I didn’t think, even a place where they really tried for humor, unless I’ve gotten so old I don’t recognize anything funny anymore.

There was a little too much silliness in this movie for my personal tastes:  I thought it was horrible that someone could make a living by breaking up relationships… although I guess that it’s the natural outgrowth of the e-dating industry that has grown so rapidly over the last few years.  None of the characters actually FEEL like real people, with the exception of the lead, who does resemble a real person, but lives a life that is totally contrived.  She is smart, but her friends are stupid bordering on ridiculous.

10th and Wolf (2000)

R, 1 hr. 48 min.  Directed by: Robert Moresco.  Release Date: August 18, 2006.  DVD Release Date: September 19, 2006.

I had a single wish when this movie started.  The opening credits were hellaciously long, stretching out over an eternity of open desert.  So, I wished that the movie would get to the point.  Little did I know that I’d get what I wanted in spades.  We’re introduced to James Marsden as Tommy, who is fighting in the Gulf War and who has, quite frankly, lost his frigging mind.  Flashback seven years prior and we learn that Tommy has actually mellowed with age and that he and his cousins were way too involved in their Mafioso heritage.  They were probably way too involved with the latest drama on Jersey Shore, too, but that isn’t actively discussed on camera.  It might just be personal conjecture.

Chances are good that you, like me, will wonder if you’ve managed to wander in to a tackier version of The Godfather.  It’s also possible that I’ve now associated all movies about the Mafia with The Godfather, because the question does seem to come up on this blog pretty frequently whenever I start watching movies about organized crime.  But, this felt so much like that greatest Mafia flick that I kept expecting that song (I don’t know what it’s called, but you know the one I’m talking about) to start playing in the background.  I suppose what’s gone down is that half the movie is so clichéd and melodramatic that it fails to develop its own sense of self.  Oh, and then the clown appeared and starting singing an opera song I remember being in The Godfather.  Wait, what?  I’m checking my drink.

 

At the end of the day, the only thing I actually enjoyed about this movie was Leslie Anne Warren, and her role was so brief that she couldn’t really do anything to fix this hot mess.  There were actually several big names in very small parts, which was a bit of a surprise:  Val Kilmer appears, as do Dennis Hopper, Brian Dennehy, and Tommy Lee (I’m hoping some sort of decon was available to the other members of the cast).  

I got to about the 80 minute mark and I did something that (1) I don’t do very often and (2) I’m a little ashamed at myself for doing.  I turned it off.  I just couldn’t watch this keep going on and on with its insipid little tale of betrayal and machismo so thick it was starting to smell like aqua velva.  I considered breaking the DVD and telling Netflix it never arrived, but then I thought that might be a bit of an overreaction.  Just a bit.  

If you’re looking for a GOOD organized crime movie, there are better options:  The Godfather, Scarface, Donnie Brasco, Goodfellas, hell, even The Narrows was better, and I’d rather get a root canal than sit through that drudgery again.  This is what happens when I give James Marsden a chance because he didn’t suck in Sex Drive. 

Midnight Cowboy (1969)

R, 1 hr. 53 min.  Directed By:  John Schlesinger.  Release Date:  May 25, 1969.  DVD Release Date:  Jan 1, 2000.

To see this movie, I almost upped the end date for my “classic movies” project when a reader suggested it.  However, I decided to stick to my original guns, and wouldn’t you know it, Midnight Cowboy appeared on Netflix’s streaming option only three months later.  I’d seen pieces of this over the years, and knew some trivia about the movie from various places.   Basically, what I knew was that when Zap Branigan loses his job as DOOP’s fleet commander and is lounging on a corner wearing a fringed leather jacket and red neckerchief with his former aide, Kif, it was a Midnight Cowboy spoof.  I also knew that this was the first X-rated film to ever win an Academy Award.  That might actually be the “only” rather than the “first,” but I’m on the right track. 

Watching this all the way through, I filled in the blanks.  First, I realized that Jon Voight plays arguably the most inept hooker ever.  And I do mean ever.  I suspect it’s the only time a member of the world’s oldest profession has ever paid out to his or her “john” (although “jane” may be more appropriate in this case) after the deed was done.  I learned there are some good performances in this, including Dustin Hoffman and Jon Voight.  I was also surprised by how frank an open the discussion of the sexual content goes.  If the point was to spotlight the life of male prostitues, then there were no holds barred, no doors left closed.  I have to give the filmmakers credit for that.  It was pretty brave, and while I didn’t think that Midnight Cowboy was more graphic than what you might find in an R-rated movie today (or a PG-13 movie, for that matter) I think it must have been some scandalous-ass shit, to quote Ray from Archer. 

This isn’t going to be everyone’s movie.  It’s not… fun.  And frankly, it’s not all that interesting.  I’m not really concerned about what the he-whores were up to in the 60s.  But, I’d heard some very good things about this movie.  From a technical perspective, that’s certainly true.  The performers are top notch, and speaking of Jon Voight, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a better performance out of the man who gave us Angelina Jolie.  Come to think of it, I’ve never seen a better performance out of her, either.  Dustin Hoffman was great, but I have seen him do better.  There are a few story elements that I found to be confusing… such as the flashbacks to Crazy Annie, which are not only not entirely clear, they don’t help “explain” why Joe Buck is where he is.  I hear tell the book that this movie was based on has much more information attached to those flashbacks, but that’s all hearsay.

This might be an interesting look in the life and culture of New Yorkers in the 60s… but you really have to be interested.  If you’re looking at joining the world’s oldest profession, I’d suggest another movie for reference.  Maybe Deuce Bigalow, because even old Deuce pulled in more income than Joe Buck.  Actually, Deuce pulls in more in the first attempt than we saw Joe Buck get in the whole movie.

Buying the Cow (2000)

R, 1 hr. 28 min.  Directed by: Walt Becker.  Release Date: October 1, 2000.  DVD Release Date: December 17, 2002.

I’m always impressed when someone manages to make a feature length film out of a simple cultural concept.  In this case, the concept is the old adage about someone “not buying the cow” because they’re “getting the milk for free.”  I’ve never heard anyone use this expression with anything but sarcasm in mind, in part because I’m pretty sure I don’t know any women who might enjoy being compared to a cow, but also because the concept is out of date.  In a world where most of us sample the occasional glass of milk before we find the perfect cow (sorry ladies), the whole adage just doesn’t bear repeating seriously, due to the whole hypocritical tone that is put in to effect.  Buying the Cow isn’t the best example of how a silly cultural construct can be used in film, but it does manage to be moderately entertaining without going overboard.

Ryan Reynolds is probably the single biggest draw in what might otherwise have been too much like, well, about two-thirds of Jerry O’Connell’s resume, to be worth watching.   Reynolds is funny, but he’s kind of the same funny he always was until about 2009 and he was more or less forced in to a variety of roles, so you can miss this one and not really miss all that much.  There’s also something about this character that makes me wonder how much of it is things that Reynolds would do in real life.  The scene where he’s giving himself a naked pep talk before hitting the bars comes to mind, that feels like it’s a personal touch in much the same way that Robin Williams’ ad libbing sometimes feels like a personal touch.  And by personal touch I’m not making a pun, I mean it comes from experience.  Jerry O’Connell, on the other hand, has played this role before and more than once.  His cameo in Can’t Hardly Wait could be his role here regressed 10 years, and his role in Tomcats is so close to identical that it would be hard to tell one from the other if the two scripts were written up in to a book.

The movie may have been just another loop in the infinite cycle of gross-out comedies aimed at the older teen and 20-something male audience, but there are a few genuinely funny scenes.  There are no really good performances, none of those moments that make you feel like you’re witnessing real life, and a few moments that make you cringe.  The very idea of the ending gave me a bit of the heebie jeebies, even though it was based on an accident.  I do happen to think the discussion of points of view differing wildly even in the same incident is pretty good.  

If you’re bored, there are worse ways to spend your time.  If you’re a fan of O’Connell, Reynolds, or even Alyssa Milano, there are other places to watch them work than this.  And Netflix wonders why people are complaining about the quality of their streaming releases.

Trailer Alert - Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter (2012)

So I have a few concerns about this movie, mostly that Tim Burton is pretty clearly taking himself WAY too seriously in this and that he's also pretty clearly not consulted the master of all vampire tales (by which I mean Joss Whedon) to make this, but I suspect there'll be some fun to be had here.  The Hunger Games brought us a lot of decent trailers.  I got to make fun of undead Kristen Stewart in Twilight, Breaking Yawn: Part 2.  I saw the new Spidey reboot show it's face, and there was the trailer for What to Expect When You're Expecting... and I have to give them props for um, appropriating that title.  The movie will clearly not be what I expected.