Hotel Transylvania 3 Summer Vacation

Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation (2018) 

Directed by Genndy Tartakovsky

Written by Michael McCullers, Genndy Tartakovsky

Starring Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Andy Samberg, David Spade, Selena Gomez

Release Date July 13th, 2018

Published July 14th, 2018

Hotel Transylvania Summer Vacation is the third and least offensive of this trilogy of Adam Sandler starring animated comedies. I wasn’t a fan of the first two Hotel Transylvania movies which felt, to me, too scatological, like a sanitized version of what Sandler does in his live action work. This time, however, with the franchise leaving the titular hotel there is something of a different feel to everything and for the first time, I laughed out loud more than once watching a Hotel Transylvania movie. 

Hotel Transylvania Summer Vacation finds our hero Drac (Sandler) lonely. Sure, he has a loving family and great friends but he wants a companion and at the same time feels guilty for wanting one for the first time since the death of his wife. Drac’s daughter Mavis meanwhile, mistakes his loneliness for stress and comes up with a solution, a dream cruise to the Bermuda Triangle. The whole family is going including Frank (Kevin James), Griffin the Invisible Man (David Spade), Murray the Mummy (Keegan Michael Key) and Wayne the Wolf and his wife Wanda and ALL of their kids. 

While Drac appreciates his daughter’s effort a cruise for a hotel owner feels rather redundant but things pick up when he Drac meets the Captain of the Cruise ship, Ericka (Kathryn Hahn). Drac is immediately smitten and I must say, the scenes with Drac overcome with feelings on meeting Ericka is very cute and it made me smile. The follow up scene in which an over-confident Drac struts around the ship to Bruno Mars’ “24 Karat Magic” is delightful with a funny if not all that original payoff. 

So, we have a love story on our hands and that means we need obstacles and this movie has a pretty good one. Ericka has a secret, the cruise is a sham and she has set it up so she can get revenge on Drac. You see, Ericka is Ericka Van Helsing, of the vampire-killing Van Helsings. She’s trained her whole life to kill Drac. Her great-grandfather Van Helsing (Jim Gaffigan) has stayed alive long past a normal lifespan, just to see his granddaughter vanquish Drac as he had failed to. 

That’s a pretty clever conflict, I gotta admit, I really liked that. The first film played a similar conflict with Andy Samberg’s human falling for Selena Gomez’ vampire but that was somehow far less fun than this. This film seems to delight a little more in the conflict as Drac is the one who is unaware of the danger he’s in. I really enjoyed the romantic sequence of Drac repeatedly saving Ericka while she’s attempting to recover a weapon she intends to kill him with. She begins to fall for him and yet she’s torn. It’s just clever enough to be amusing. 

My favorite gag in Hotel Transylvania could not be more simple. It’s a flashback to Van Helsing attempting to capture Drac and his friends on a train. We see Van Helsing enter, we know the monsters are hidden at the front of the car. We see Van Helsing pull out a box of matches, the tension builds because we know what’s coming, we know from the other movies how Frank reacts to fire. When Van Helsing lights the match, Frank freaks out and the scene and the movie are off and running. There’s nothing special here, but the simplicity made me laugh. 

Hotel Transylvania 3 Summer Vacation is nothing special, it’s certainly not a Pixar quality work. This isn’t art but for a shallow kiddie flick, it’s pretty good. It made me laugh at these monster characters for the first time in the entire franchise so that’s something. Having low expectations certainly helped matters. But there is something more genuine and winning about this outing in the Hotel Transylvania franchise. Something slightly more clever and less lowest common denominator. Whatever the reason, I enjoyed it enough to say this one is worth seeing. 

Movie Review Ramona & Beezus

Ramona & Beezus (2010) 

Directed by Elizabeth Allen 

Written by Laurie Craig, Nick Pustay 

Starring Joey King, Selena Gomez, John Corbett, Bridget Moynihan, Ginnifer Goodwin, Josh Duhamel, Sandra Oh 

Release Date July 23rd, 2010 

Published July 22nd, 2010 

The movie is called “Ramona and Beezus” but it really could be called just Ramona. Beezus, played by Disney Channel star Selena Gomez, is integral to the plot, but the story is unquestionably about Ramona played by 9-year-old Joey King as whirling dervish of sweet funny chaos. That's not to speak ill of Selena Gomez, she's a charming actress, but up against young Joey King's incredible performance, it's hard for anyone to stand out. 

Ramona Quimby is a precocious kid who doesn't really go looking for trouble but certainly finds it. With her huge imagination, Ramona can turn even the most straightforward activity, like the hanging rings on the playground, into a massive adventure that ends with her nearly missing a class because she has somehow hung herself upside down. There are some who will watch Ramona daydreaming, playing and finding trouble and diagnose her with attention deficit disorder but the movie, directed by Elizabeth Allen, has no time for diagnosing its star. The movie has far more serious and true elements to examine.

In a plot twist that was not part of Beverly Cleary's sunny fun vision of life on Klickitat St. in Portland Oregon, Ramona's dad (John Corbett) loses his job just as the family is building an addition on their already sprawling home. With Mom (Bridget Moynihan) heading back to work, the stress in the house begins to affect Ramona who finds new trouble in trying to help her parents keep their house.

This dramatic plot turn however, does not get overwhelmingly dramatic and for the most part Ramona and Beezus is breezy, warmhearted and sweet. 9-year-old Joey King is wonderful as Ramona, perfectly capturing her unintentional mischievousness and the soulful look in her eyes when she inevitably makes a giant mess of things.

John Corbett is terrific as the father who stays positive, patient and caring even as he seems a little dazed being over 40 and thrust back into the job hunt. Bridget Moynihan has far less screen time but her presence is felt early on. Rounding out the cast is a sweet romantic pairing between Ramona's Aunt Bea played by Ginnifer Goodwin and Ramona's neighbor Hobart played by Josh Duhamel.

Credit Goodwin and Duhamel for putting aside star ego to take minor supporting roles - both could be taking lead roles; Duhamel is in fact hard at work on another Transformers sequel but saw quality in Ramona and Beezus and could not pass it up. “Ramona and Beezus” is wonderful family entertainment. The drama of mom and dad's marriage trouble related to his unemployment is merely the underscore to a story about a big hearted little girl who finds adventure and trouble in equal measure just by being her slightly off-kilter self.

There is a reason that decades after they first appeared on Klickitat Street, courtesy of the pen of Beverly Cleary, why “Ramona and Beezus” are still around. These are quality stories and characters that resonate through time with their radiant, fun loving spirits and big, big hearts. Joey King is wonderfully well cast and though her radiance overshadows Selena Gomez as Beezus, it speaks to Selena Gomez's generosity as an actress that she is such wonderful support to King's lead performance. 

Ramona and Beezus is a delight. 

Movie Review Monte Carlo

Monte Carlo (2011) 

Directed by Thomas Bezucha 

Written by April Blair, Maria Maggenti, Thomas Maggenti 

Starring Selena Gomez, Leighton Meester, Katie Cassidy

Release Date July 1st, 2011 

Published July 2nd, 2011

With Selena Gomez on the cover of the September issue of Elle Magazine, their LatinX special, I went and found one of the few times when I have had the chance to write about Selena Gomez. In 2011, Gomez co-starred with Leighton Meester and Katie Cassidy in the forgettable but pleasant teen comedy Monte Carlo. Selena Gomez proved to be a very natural lead for a teen comedy and because of her, Monte Carlo is more enjoyable than many similar teen girl comedies.

Monte Carlo is the story of three friends who travel to Paris for one of the worst tours of all time and stumble upon one truly unexpected adventure that finds one of them impersonating a tabloid superstar, all three jetting off to Monte Carlo, and each finding love in unique ways. Is it a great adventure? No, but for what it is, it's not bad.

Selena Gomez is the star of Monte Carlo as Grace, a Texas High Schooler who has just graduated. Her plan is to head off to Paris with her best friend, Emma (Katie Cassidy) but her mom (Andie McDowell) and step-dad (Brett Cullen) have an addition to her plans. Dad will upgrade Grace and Emma's travel plans if they don't mind having his daughter Meg (Leighton Meester) join the trip.

Naturally, there is tension between Grace and Meg; they haven't exactly bonded since their parents got together. They will need to get along however as once the trio arrive in Paris they quickly find themselves abandoned by their terrifically awful tourist group. The tour scenes are quite funny with the speedy tour guide dragging the group past Paris's greatest landmarks in less time than it would take to snap a picture.

Stuck in the rain and miles from their modest hostel accommodations, the girls stop off at a luxury hotel to dry off. That's when the adventure begins. At the hotel Emma and Meg encounter Cordelia Winthrop Scott (Gomez) and find that Grace is a dead ringer for the heiress. After overhearing that Cordelia is pulling a disappearing act that will have her out of the way for a week the girls hatch an accidental plot to replace her.

The plan was just to take Cordelia's luxury suite for a night in order to get out of the rain but the following morning finds the trio ushered to a limo and on to a private jet headed to Monte Carlo. From there the plot cleverly conspires to keep the girls from escaping. Most films of this sort, modest, middle budget, niche comedies, skimp on character motivation. Monte Carlo actually takes care to make sure that the characters are moving in particular directions for particular reasons.

Grace may not want to keep up the Cordelia charade but when she finds that a children's charity will suffer without Cordelia on hand to raise funds, she changes her tune. It helps that she is immediately smitten with Theo (Pierre Boulanger) the scion of the charity founder. Meg too wants to escape this situation but when she falls for an Aussie vacationer her plans change as well.

Monte Carlo is far from brilliant comedy but within its modest ambitions it is successful at earning smiles and a few minor laughs. The young stars are sweet and best of all they perform with purpose in a movie that has a clear motivation and coheres to a specific plot. Again, I cannot express how nice it is to watch a movie, especially a teen-centric comedy, that cares why characters do the things they do.

Selena Gomez was on the track for stardom ever since she started out as a regular playmate for Barney the Dinosaur. Gomez is sweet, smart and pretty and the makers of Monte Carlo showcase her playfulness as well as her beauty. Monte Carlo gets extra credit from me for portraying Gomez's young romance with a light and comic touch. The romance is sweet and chaste and fitting of the young and playful tone of the rest of Monte Carlo. 

Leighton Meester also showed big star potential in Monte Carlo. Meester's roles prior to Monte Carlo had shown her to be a bland beauty with a mostly blank, expressionless face. In Monte Carlo however, especially in chastely romantic scenes with Aussie hunk Luke Bracey, Meester is lively and fun in an effortless yet PG friendly way. Considering that the role Meester took on just before Monte Carlo was the unwatchable supposed 'thriller' The Roommate, Monte Carlo was Casablanca by comparison. 

Monte Carlo doesn't reinvent the teen comedy wheel but in its formulaic, PG comedy way, it's a pleasant distraction and a breath of fresh air compared to a kid comedies of the same time period, 2010 and 11, like Mr. Popper's Penguins or even a rom-com like Something Borrowed, both of which looked downright amateurish compared to the effortless family friendly fun of Monte Carlo which is both kid flick and modest rom-com.'