Movie Review The Post

The Post (2017) 

Directed by Steven Spielberg

Written by Josh Singer, Liz Hannah

Starring Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks, Bob Odenkirk, Sarah Paulson, Tracy Letts, Bradley Whitford

Release Date December 22nd, 2017 

The Post is an of-the-moment history lesson about the important role of the media in America. Steven Spielberg has made arguably the most relevant movie of our political moment, given the way that President Trump has made attacking the media a staple of his public discourse. Casting two of America’s most beloved and respected actors in the lead roles only deepens the importance of The Post.

The title The Post refers to the Washington Post, which in 1971 battled the Nixon White House over the so-called Pentagon Papers. The Pentagon Papers refers to a study commissioned by then Secretary of State MacNamara, who tasked members of the Pentagon, including young genius, Daniel Ellsburg (Matthew Rhys), to study the state of the Vietnam War.

After not getting the positive returns that they had hoped to get, MacNamara lied to the media and tried to bury the report. Ellsburg then stole a copy of the report from Pentagon partners, The Rand Corporation, and made copies which he leaked to the New York Times. The Times began publishing the report in early 1971 in pieces before the Nixon White House took the Times to court to stop them.

This is where the Washington Post comes in. Spielberg picks up the story with a desperate Ben Bradlee (Tom Hanks) hammering his reporters to find out where the New York Times is getting their information. He wants a copy of the report so that the Post can publish them as well. While his reporters are scouring their sources, Bradlee’s boss, Katherine Graham (Meryl Streep) is battling with the board of directors over her position as owner of the company.

Find my full length review in the Geeks Community on Vocal 

Movie Review The Brothers Solomon

The Brothers Solomon (2007) 

Directed by Bob Odenkirk

Written by Will Forte

Starring Will Forte, Will Arnett, Kristen Wiig, Lee Majors

Release Date September 7th, 2007

Published September September 9th, 2007

Bob Odenkirk is a really funny guy. Anyone who has seen his all too brief HBO sketch show Mr. Show with his good friend David Cross, has seen his talent on display. His first directorial feature, Melvin Goes To Dinner was a terrific movie. A talky, brainy, low budget comedy that displayed Odenkirk's ability to let a joke build without ever forcing a punchline.

Since that mini-success Bob Odenkirk's career has gone in the toilet. His follow up to Melvin Goes To Dinner was a spectacularly misguided prison comedy called Let's Go To Prison. Now comes an equally inept, though funnier -not that that was a big challenge-, The Brothers Solomon. Written by Saturday Night Live cast member Will Forte, the film plays like a comedy of what not to do when making a comedy.

In The Brothers Solomon, Will Arnett, of TV's beloved Arrested Development, and Will Forte, play John and Dean Solomon, brothers who did not grow up like most folk. Following the tragic death of their mother, thei father (Lee Majors) moved the boys to the north pole, they asked to move there and dad abided, where they were homeschooled and went years without contact with other human beings.

The social shortcomings of the boys has contributed to lifelong virginity and them living together; likely for good. When their father falls into a coma a kindly doctor informs them that sometimes people come out of comas if they have something to live for. Remembering that dad always wanted a grandson, the boys begin a quest to make a baby for dad.

Of course, being socially awkward, to put it kindly, the brothers fail the dating scene miserably. So, they turn to the website craigslist.com where they find Janine (Kristen Wiig), a kind woman willing to carry their child.... for 12, 000 dollars and no sex. Then it's off to the fertility clinic and nine months of waiting. Can dad last that long? Will either brother ever get it right with a woman? Will you give the slightest damn?

The first two questions I won't spoil, the last question however is a simple no. As directed by Bob Odenkirk, The Brothers Solomon plays like the bastard child of Knocked Up and Dumb & Dumber, only not funny or even as remotely interesting as those two very different comedies. Where Knocked Up bothered to create characters we cared about enough to laugh with, The Brothers Solomon simply has characters and if you can find a way to care about them you are a better man than I.

Dumb & Dumber is, at the very least, energetic in it's insipid way. The Brothers Solomon is a snoozer from beginning to end. Here is yet another 'comedy', like the recent ping pong movie Balls Of Fury, that believes that certain things just ARE funny because they're there. In Balls of Fury it was the lead character's love of Def Leppard. In The Brothers Solomon it's supposed to be funny that the filmmakers have assigned the song St. Elmo's Fire as the brothers unofficial theme song.

Oh and it's also funny that Lee Majors plays the boy's father. Not that Majors does or says anything remotely humorous. No. Just the fact that he is Lee Majors is apparently supposed to be funny. That's the joke. He used to be The Fall Guy (shrug). If you find that fact funny, then maybe this is the movie for you. I, for one, need something a little more than that.

I must admit that I did laugh once during The Brothers Solomon and my apologies to the filmmakers for spoiling their one funny moment here. When the brothers find out that dad is in the hospital they go flying out of their apartment for a race to the hospital. On the way, they stop to dispute a late video charge at a local video store. The line "Dad would have wanted us to dispute that late charge" cracked me up.

The only other minor pleasure I took away from The Brothers Solomon were cameos from some of my favorite TV performers. Sam Lloyd plays Ted Buckland on TV's best sitcom Scrubs and shows up here as a doctor. Also from Scrubs, one of the show's top bit players, Charles Chun who plays Dr. Wen on Scrubs and here plays Dr. Wang. Seeing Lloyd and Chun allowed me a few moments to lapse into dreams of my favorite Scrubs episodes as I waited out the 90 minute runtime of The Brothers Solomon.

Despite it all; I remain convinced of the talents of Bob Odenkirk. I have seen far too much good work from Odenkirk to write him off yet. A word of caution though Bob, another Let's Go To Prison or The Brothers Solomon and you are off the creative roll call. Get back together with your Melvin Goes to Dinner writing partner Michael Blieden, drop the budget, and make Melvin 2.

And stay away from Will Arnett. He's now starred in both Let's Go To Prison and The Brothers Solomon and had a small role in Hot Rod. Clearly, Mr. Arnett is movie poison.

Movie Review The Incredibles 2

The Incredible 2 (2018) 

Directed by Brad Bird

Written by Brad Bird 

Starring Craig T. Nelson, Holly Hunter, Samuel L. Jackson, Bob Odenkirk, Sarah Vowell

Release Date June 15th, 2018

Published June 14th, 2018

Why don't I love The Incredibles? I have been racking my brain trying to come up with reasons why I have fallen out of love with the Pixar franchise and there really are too many little issues with the story, characters and lack of laughs for me to narrow it down. After sitting through nearly 4 hours of an Incredibles 1 and Incredibles 2 double feature I walked out baffled that the magic I felt back in 2004 was missing.

The Incredibles 2 picks up the story of the Parr family led by Bob Parr AKA Mr. Incredible (Craig T. Nelson) and Helen Parr AKA Elastigirl and including their three children, oldest daughter Violet (Sarah Vowell), middle child Dash (Huck Milner) and baby Jack Jack (Eli Fucile). Like their parents, the kids have superpowers as well with Violet possessing invisibility and being able to create force fields and Dash having super speed.

And then there is Jack Jack whose powers only came out at the end of the first Incredibles movie and only when mom and dad couldn't see them. In Incredibles 2 a significant subplot is dedicated to Jack Jack's developing more than half a dozen superpowers, none of which he can seem to control and some of them incredibly dangerous. Jack Jack's powers are the bright light of this otherwise drab outing.

The main story of Incredibles 2 centers on Helen taking a job as a superhero and leaving Bob at home to care for the kids. The CEO of a major corporation, Winston Deavor (Bob Odenkirk) has dedicated some of his vast fortune to helping bring superheroes out of hiding. If you remember the original film, Supers were driven underground following a series of catastrophes and lawsuits. Deavor wants to use Elastigirl to show the world it still needs superheroes.

Helen immediately finds a nemesis in The Screenslaver, a villain who uses screens to hypnotize people into doing his bidding. Using her smarts Helen is able to make quick work of The Screen Saver but she wonders why it turned out to be so easy, considering how brilliant the villain had seemed as he was executing his plan for world domination. The answer is rather unsurprising, I had the villain guessed rather quickly and had to hope that the movie would find a clever subversion of expectations. Sadly, that never comes.

There is nothing all that remarkable about the story being told in Incredibles 2. Where most other Pixar movies have invention and humor on their side, The Incredibles relies on vague allusions to deep issues intended to flatter the audience for recognizing them. This is however, only puddle deep philosophizing. The makers of Incredibles 2 claim to have something to say about gender roles as they put Helen in the workforce and Bob at home but there isn't much beyond that presentation of the idea.

Helen is a terrific hero, smart and tough and a great role model of how a woman can be both a world class superhero and a great mom. This isn't exactly new ground that we are covering here, The Incredibles 2 is set in a vague early to mid 60's aesthetic and is deeply rooted in the aged politics of the time which seem quaint in today's environment. The Incredibles 2 director Brad Bird brings nothing new to this and the lack of depth in the characters is exposed by how simple the empowerment message is.

Yes, it's a movie for kids, I can hear and I am well aware of what The Incredibles 1 & 2 are. Toy Story is also a movie for kids and yet the makers of that film franchise still find deep and meaningful messages about family and aging and acceptance that go beyond the surface while maintaining a story simple enough for kids to follow. The Toy Story movies are also wildly funny on top of the deep themes, something that neither of The Incredibles movies are.

There is a distinct lack of laughs in The Incredibles 1 & 2. In fact, Incredibles 1 is downright disturbing at times in its lack of a sense of humor. A running bit about the dangers of capes features multiple deaths of superheroes and eventually the death of the film's lead villain. Then there is the Razer Blade scene wherein our hero hides behind the rotting corpse of a former friend to escape detection by a high tech hunting gadget. Incredibles 2 doesn't have anything that rivals those dark moments but it's not much brighter in tone either.

Watching this double feature of The Incredibles I was taken aback by the lack of fun. There is a dourness that hangs over these films, an oppressiveness that edges into the movie in the subplot about superheroes forced into hiding. The stories nod toward Ayn Rand of all people in blatant talking points about how super people have to sublimate themselves to make average people feel better about themselves.

In The Incredibles 1 the super villain, Syndrome (Jason Lee), wants to give everyone high powered gadgets so that everyone can be super and thus no one can be super. The Incredibles 2 turns Winston Deavor into a John Galt like figure who aims to create a utopia where superheroes can once again take their rightful place in society, out of the shadows. I'm not here to argue Randian philosophy, I'm just expressing how off-putting it is to endure such mediocre philosophy during what should be a fun adventure.

In The Incredibles 2 there is an attempt to hypnotize supers and use them for villainy. Some have pointed out that this is akin to the government using the best and the brightest to further the agenda of the mediocre. I'm not saying that was Brad Bird's intention but the film is so obvious in the Randian comparisons that I can see how people would arrive at the conspiracy theory. Here again, even if there is an agenda at play, there is no depth or commitment to it just as there is no commitment or depth to notions about gender roles.

The makers of The Incredibles 1 and 2 seem to want credit for depth without actually having to be deep. The defenders of these movies want to claim they are 'just kids movies' while still wanting to claim they have deeper themes. None of it works because neither The Incredibles or The Incredibles 2 commits to a specific idea of what the movie is supposed to be beyond a pastiche of superhero cliches dressed up with the talent of Pixar animation.

Then there is the villain, The Screensaver. This is not a particularly compelling villain. I already mentioned how obvious the identity of the villain is and how the film fails to make the character or the plot all that interesting beyond the predictable reveal. What I haven't yet discussed is the very notion of The Screensaver as a character. The character uses screens to hypnotize people. The movie is set in the 60's so the screen in question is the television screen, for the most part.

The obvious joke however is like a dad joke observation at its most lame. The Screensaver is a puddle deep comment on our addiction to our screens, our phones, tablets and other such modern technology. Like the attempts at Randian philosophizing and gender role questions, this idea is underwritten and relies on surface level observations. Obsessing over screens is bad, put away your screens and spend time with your family and blah, blah, blah. Thankfully, this a mostly unformed idea and we don't spend too much time on it but it's another failed attempt at a deeper theme, a hallmark of The Incredibles movies.

I have long been a Pixar apologist, one who has gone as far as defending the quality of The Cars franchise, which yes, I do believe is a better and much funnier series than The Incredibles. I have loved nearly everything Pixar has done and back in 2004, I was a big fan of The Incredibles. I had misgivings then but I brushed them aside to focus on how fun the movie was. It's less fun on a rewatch however as its flaws stand out more now that I am so familiar with it.

The Incredibles 2 underlines the flaws of the original and piles on even larger flaws. Brad Bird's baby is filled with underwhelming ideas and a lack of laughter. There is a distinct joylessness to The Incredibles 2. The filmmakers need to lighten up a bit and while scenes involving baby Jack Jack have a light funny feel, the rest of the movie is rather drab and obvious. Worst of all, the fun is undermined by the faint notions of depth, ideas dressed up as deeper themes but lacking actual depth.

Movie Review Run Ronnie Run

Run Ronnie Run (2003) 

Directed by Troy Miller 

Written by David Cross, Bob Odenkirk, Scott Aukerman, B.J Porter, Brian Posehn 

Starring David Cross, Bob Odenkirk, David Koechner, Jill Talley, Ben Stiller, Jack Black 

Release Date September 16th, 2003 

Published December 15th, 2003

Being a huge fan of the HBO series “Mr. Show with Bob & David,” I have been hearing for a very long while about the film based on one of the show’s best sketches, Run Ronnie Run. The story of the most arrested man in America, one Ronnie Dobbs, Run Ronnie Run went into production in November of 2000 and premiered at the Sundance film festival in 2001. So how come you have never seen it in theaters or on video? Because New Line Cinema decided not to release the film. The cynical bastards behind Dumb and Dumberer decided not to release Run Ronnie Run???

Maybe that is for the best, because though the film has some truly inspired hysterical moments, the compromised version that has seeped out through various sources is not quite what it's creators had hoped. Based on characters created in the first season of Mr. Show, Run Ronnie Run is the story of Ronnie Dobbs (David Cross), a Georgia redneck who enjoys getting drunk and raising hell. He occasionally lives in a trailer with his three illegitimate kids, all named Ronnie Jr., and his common law wife Tammy (Mr. Show regular Jill Talley).

Ronnie gains notoriety after his numerous drunken arrests on the faux Cops show Fuzz catch the attention of a British TV producer named Terry Twillstein (Bob Odenkirk). Terry immediately heads to Georgia and, after bailing Ronnie out of jail, brings Ronnie to Hollywood. Together they pitch a TV show in which Ronnie will travel the country getting arrested while being followed by a camera crew.

The show is an immediate smash, but fame gets the better of Ronnie. Before long he is holding big celebrity parties and sleeping with the model from his favorite beer commercial, rather than drinking beer with his old friends or watching a mangy dog eat vomit. As his friends say, “Ronnie, you've changed man.” Soon Ronnie has quit drinking and can't even get arrested.

It's a smart, funny satire of the classic rags to riches, fame corrupts story told in a surprisingly straight linear story. Whereas on Mr. Show both Bob and David play multiple characters in one episode, in the movie they generally remain as one character, save for a couple of dream sequences. The film does hint at other Mr. Show sketches, including a dream sequence music video of Bob and David's pop band send up 3 times 1 minus 1. There’s also a brilliant revision of their Ronnie Dobbs sketch "Fuzz: The Musical" with Mandy Patinkin as Ronnie.

There are a number of brilliant moments in Run Ronnie Run like Ronnie's uncovering of the worldwide gay conspiracy with an excellent cameo by Kids in the Hall star Scott Thompson and Seinfeld's Patrick Warburton. Also there’s an odd but brilliant outtake with Jack Black as the Dick Van Dyke character in Mary Poppins singing a song that has to be heard to be believed. F-CKING BRILLIANT!

That said, the cut I saw seems somewhat compromised and lacks the snap of the sketch version. Ronnie is a little more sweet and sympathetic, as is the character of Tammy. What made Ronnie brilliant on the show was his complete self delusion that encapsulated every Neanderthal, shirtless redneck in the history of the show, Cops. The guys on Cops are not sympathetic characters. They are often drunken, homophobic wife beaters, which Ronnie was in the sketch. But those traits are either excised or underplayed in the film version and that tames much of the satire.

Nevertheless, the worst of Run Ronnie Run is far funnier than anything in New Line's Dumb and Dumberer, and that thing was dumped into the theaters on 2000+ screens. They could at least put Ronnie out on DVD (Ed. Note – Run Ronnie Run will be released on DVD in September 2003). It may not be everything it's genius creators had in mind but it's as good or better than most modern comedies.

Movie Review Melvin Goes to Dinner

Melvin Goes to Dinner (2003) 

Directed by Bob Odenkirk

Written by Michael Blieden 

Starring Michael Blieden, Melora Waters, Stephanie Courtney, Matt Price 

Release Date January 2003 

Published May 19th, 2003 

Bob Odenkirk is best known as half of the comic team behind HBO's cult comedy Mr. Show. With his partner David Cross, Odenkirk created some of the funniest sketch comedies ever on television. Now Odenkirk is venturing out into unknown territory directing his first feature film, and like Mr. Show, it's a risky comic sketch.

Melvin Goes To Dinner is a single, handheld camera following the twists and turns of a conversation between four semi-strangers. Like the classic My Dinner With Andre, Melvin is a fascinating experiment in comic dialogue and the ability of a director to hold your attention without resorting to trickery.

The Melvin of the title is Michael Bleiden, who wrote the script and performed the show as a stage play in Los Angeles. In the film, he and the original stage actors from the LA production, Annabelle Gurwitch as Sarah, Stephanie Courtney as Alex, and Matt Price as Joey, reunite in an LA restaurant. What unfolds is an hour-long conversation that twists from mocking discussions of ghosts in Alex's apartment to intriguing takes on religion, infidelity and strip clubs.

Alex is friends with Joey from business school. She is a man's woman, the type who will join the guys for a trip to the strip club. Joey, who fell into dinner after an accidental phone call, is also old friends with Melvin but they haven't seen much of each other recently. Alex has been friends with Sarah for years and just happened to bump into her on her way to dinner with Joey, forcing her to join them. That explains how everyone got there but there are deeper connections that are revealed during this marathon dinner conversation.

It is so rare to hear great dialogue in the age of Jerry Bruckheimer and Michael Bay. This makes Melvin a welcome change of pace from the majority of modern scripts that merely lend context to action scenes or gross out comedy. Melvin is the extremely rare film that doesn't just feature great dialogue, it is about great dialogue.

This material would be difficult for any director, especially for a first time director, yet Odenkirk manages the material very well. His observational, voyeuristic camera quietly shifts from shot to shot never getting in the way, never tipping off the story’s twists, never leading the audience by using tricks of perspective or showy camera movement.

As I mentioned earlier, the actual conversation is only about an hour long. The remaining 23 minutes of the film is made up of well-done flashbacks. Featured in cameos are Odenkirk cohorts like Jack Black as a mental patient and David Cross as a motivational guru to Odenkirk as one of Sarah's ex-boyfriends, a surprisingly poignant and revealing cameo that helps deepen Sarah's character. Maura Tierney also appears as Melvin's sister, and Melora Waters rounds out the cameos as Melvin's married girlfriend.

The script mines its best material from infidelity. Melvin is dating a married woman and has done it before. Joey is married and admits that he often considers cheating on his wife. Sarah, like Melvin, has been on the cheating side of a relationship while Alex admits to having been the victim of cheating boyfriends on more than one occasion. She claims to have come out unfazed, due to distractions at work.

The stories they relate about their relationships are funny, smart and touching. Not touching in that cloying movie way but in a more real human way that isn't with a major dramatic flourish or revelation but just comes from shared experience. This is a terrific movie, witty and smart with four very likable actors, well-timed cameos and flashbacks and well directed by first time Director Bob Odenkirk. The DVD for Melvin, courtesy of Sundance Home Entertainment, is in the style of Odenkirk's irreverent Mr. Show sense of humor. 

The DVD features two commentary tracks, including a very funny two-man commentary by Bleiden and Odenkirk and one with Odenkirk, Bleiden and Michael Penn who performed the film’s elegant film score. The DVD's best feature is a mock documentary about "The Frank Film Festival", a film festival put on by a guy named Frank in his basement with just one film. It is as much of a must see as the film itself.