Movie Review: Along Came Polly

Along Came Polly (2004) 

Directed by John Hamburg

Written by John Hamburg 

Starring Ben Stiller, Jennifer Aniston, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Debra Messing, Hank Azaria 

Release Date January 16th, 2004 

Published January 15th, 2004 

2004 is shaping up to be a big year for Ben Stiller. He has 3 films coming out in just the first five months of the year and is directing another. With Starsky and Hutch due in March, his much delayed teaming with Jack Black in Envy pushed to early Spring and a just-begun multi-episode stint on Larry David's HBO series “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” Stiller is going to be everywhere this year. His first film of the year, the romantic comedy Along Came Polly with Jennifer Aniston, gets 2004 off to a good start.

In Along Came Polly, Stiller is Rueben Feffer, an expert in risk management. Ruben's job as a risk evaluator for an insurance company has taught him to be quite cautious in everything he does. Cautious even in his personal life which has caused him to settle down with Lisa (Debra Messing) for what seems like a safe, life-long commitment. However, on their honeymoon in St Barts, the couple meets a French scuba diving instructor named Claude (Hank Azaria in a stellar cameo). Of course, Claude and Lisa end up in bed together, discovered by Rueben while doing it with their scuba gear still on. No one does this kind of indignity quite as well as Stiller, who is to humiliation what Jack Benny was to being a tightwad.

Returning home, Rueben is consoled by his friend and former child star Sandy (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) who tries to raise his spirits by taking him to a party. At the party Rueben runs into Polly Prince (Jennifer Aniston), a girl he went to junior high with and who now works as a cocktail waitress in between flights of fancy that have taken her all over the world.

Rueben and Polly are totally opposite personalities, Rueben is uptight, neurotic and fearful while Polly is adventurous, carefree and owns a ferret as a pet. However, like any man who sees an opportunity to be with a beautiful woman, Rueben puts aside his fears of spicy food, salsa dancing and ferrets. Of course, all of which leads to numerous comic foul-ups where his fears get the best of him. 

Once again, Stiller's talent for taking the worst that life can give him makes these varying humiliations terrifically funny. Even the awful bathroom scene after Rueben has suffered through dinner at an Indian restaurant and the spicy food has caused his irritable bowel syndrome to act up. Ugh!

The problem with Stiller's performance in Along Came Polly, as funny as he is, is that we have seen him do variations on this same character plenty of times. Rueben is essentially just an extension of the character he played in last years Duplex who was an extension of Greg Fokker in Meet The Parents (Not so coincidentally, Parents and Along Came Polly are both written and directed by John Hamburg). Further still, those roles were basically toned down takes on Stiller's role in There's Something About Mary. Stiller's act is still funny in Along Came Polly but it is growing a little too familiar and tiresome.

As for Jennifer Aniston, she once again shows why she is the Friend most likely to breakout as a bigtime film star. She's got it, acting chops and comic timing. Her role is surprisingly small as the film makes room for a number of supporting characters. Her Polly has little interaction with the supporting characters which makes her feel as if she were in a slightly different film. Unlike Cameron Diaz in the very similar There's Something About Mary, Aniston's Polly is played straight, above all of the humiliating gross out gags. Polly is central to the plot but is outside much of the humor of the film.

The best parts of the film are the supporting roles played by Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Alec Baldwin and Hank Azaria. These three terrific actors are in place to put Stiller in the most humiliating situations possible and they do their jobs well. Azaria is especially funny in his small role. Carrying his best accent since his gay Puerto Rican is The Birdcage, Azaria walks nude on the beach, murders the English language and as he should puts Stiller's Rueben in the most humiliating situations possible.

The supporting players, as good as they are, do however expose one of the films main flaws. Writer-Director John Hamburg can't decide on a comic tone. The script attempts to combine over-the-top slapstick, gross-out humor with a realistic romance. The over-the-top elements pull you out of the realistic story, rendering it less believable, especially at the end when the film wants you to get emotional about whether the romance will have a happy ending.

It's difficult to criticize a film that is as funny as Along Came Polly. The cast is terrific and there are a number of funny gags. Still, the romance never feels real because, as written, it gets stepped on by the slapsticky, gross-out humor. Thus we are left with a series of comic skits tied together loosely by a romance that is only in place to give the jokes context. I can kind of recommend Along Came Polly but with a slight reservations. 

Movie Review: Chasing Liberty

Chasing Liberty (2004) 

Directed by Andy Cadiff 

Written by Derek Guiley 

Starring Mandy Moore, Matthew Goode, Jeremy Piven, Annabella Sciorra, Mark Harmon

Release Date January January 9th, 2004

Published January 8th, 2004 

In my review of Mandy Moore's film debut A Walk To Remember, I employed the hack-y cliché “don't quit your day job” in reference to Ms. Moore's excruciatingly-bland performance. At that time, it was a justifiable, if horribly cynical, criticism of her performance. But that is no excuse for using such a cliché. Since then, Moore has made me eat those words (sort of.) Her pleasant turn in the pop-sensible teen drama How To Deal showed marked improvement over A Walk To Remember. Now, in her latest starring effort as the President's daughter in Chasing Liberty, Moore shows even more improvement as a charming, sweet leading lady.

Liberty is the secret service code name of Anna Foster who has spent her formative years in the largest possible spotlight. Anna is the 18-year-old daughter of a two-term President (Mark Harmon). When we meet Anna, she is about to head out on her first date ever. The date is a miserable failure that ends with Secret Service guns drawn on the boyfriend who mistakenly attempted a surprise gift. That's it for the boyfriend. Luckily, Anna has a trip with dad coming up that could provide an opportunity for fun, if she can shake the Secret Service.

On a state visit to Prague, Anna plans to meet up with a friend and head for Berlin for something called Love Fest. Dad doesn't want her to go but relents when she agrees to having a pair of top agents, Jeremy Piven and Annabella Sciorra, follow her. That plan falls apart though when dad breaks his promise and Anna is swarmed by agents while at a concert. To lose them, Anna gets the help of Ben (Matthew Good) who whisks her away on his scooter. What Anna doesn't know is that Ben is a Secret Service agent.

Thus begins a whirlwind romantic trip across Europe as Anna thinks she is evading the Secret Service while Ben fends off her advances while trying to keep up with her. Moore and Good have little chemistry and with all the next-big-thing talk about Good, I was surprised how wooden and dull he is. Moore, on the other hand, is effervescent. Comparisons to a young Doris Day are not unwarranted. She is sunny and sweet and has lost that cloying innocence that sacked her performance in A Walk To Remember.

Chasing Liberty is not a great film. It's full of typical romantic comedy clichés and those romantic dialogue bits that always pay off at the end. The typical eye-rolling moments of realization and forgiveness that you've seen a million times are not improved upon here. What makes the film nearly passable is Moore, who has found that kind of star quality that many actresses never find. Whenever she is onscreen, I couldn't help but smile. She is aided by a funny subplot involving Piven and Sciorra's Secret Service agents who fall in love while watching the first daughter fall in love.

Maybe it's my romantic idealism, but I have always wanted to backpack across Europe with a beautiful stranger and fall in love while scamming for places to sleep for a night or thumbing a ride on the back of a farm truck on it way to some tiny village that hasn't aged since the 1800s. Chasing Liberty captures some of that romantic idealism, especially in Moore's wonderfully likable performance.

Movie Review Peter Pan

Peter Pan (2003) 

Directed by P.J Hogan 

Written by P.J Hogan 

Starring Jeremy Sumpter, Jason Isaacs, Rachel Hurd Wood, Olivia Williams, Lynn Redgrave 

Release Date December 25th, 2003 

Published December 24th, 2003 

There is a tradition on stage and in televised versions of Peter Pan that has Peter portrayed by a woman. I can’t pretend to understand why this is but it does remove some of Author J.M Barrie’s more uncomfortable suggestions about Peter and Wendy’s attraction to one another. In director P.J Hogan’s new film adaptation of the more than 100-year-old fairy tale, a boy rightfully portrays Peter. Though somewhat muted, the Peter-Wendy dynamic is once again in play. Whether or not it is to an uncomfortable degree is up to the viewer.

The legendary fairy tale about the boy who refuses to grow up stars Jeremy Sumpter in the role of Peter. However, from the beginning it’s clear that the real star of the show is Wendy played by Rachel Hurd Wood. When we meet Wendy we, like Peter, float to her window and listen in as she dazzles her younger brothers John (Harry Newell) and Michael (Freddie Popplewell) with stories of pirates, Indians and swordplay.

Their revelry is broken by the arrival of their aunt Millicent (Lynn Redgrave) who informs their parents, Mr. and Mrs. Darling (Jason Isaacs and Olivia Williams), that it is time for Wendy to begin training for marriage. This means moving her out of her shared bedroom with her brothers and beginning training in elocution and manners. Essentially, it means it’s time to grow up.

Spying on this scene, Peter decides to reveal himself to Wendy and invite her to Neverland where she won’t have to grow up. This choice is made much to the dismay of Peter’s best friend Tink (Luvigne Sagnier). The scene is filled with meaningful looks and gestures of tentative flirtation and almost uncomfortable sexual tension. At Peter's invitation, Wendy with her brothers in tow is ready to fly off to Neverland.

Once in the pink clouds and green jungles of Neverland, Wendy hears the legend of Captain Hook (as tradition holds, Jason Isaacs, who also plays Wendy's father) and his band of pirates. Of course, Wendy's clumsy little brothers are immediately captured and it's up to Peter and Wendy to save them. In a wonderful action scene filled with terrific humor and exciting swordplay, Wendy and Peter save her brothers and introduce us to Hook's other nemesis, a giant alligator with a ticking clock in its stomach. The gator was previously bitten off Hook's hand as the result of a previous fight with Peter.

All of this happens very quickly. Director P.J Hogan keeps the pace and humor moving all the way through the film slowing down only momentarily for romantic interludes between Peter and Wendy. Despite what a number of critics have said about the sexual tension and romance between Wendy and Peter, it's not as creepy as it sounds. In fact, what director P.J Hogan really captures is the breathless exhilaration of first love. What Wendy and Peter experience is the first rush of the pubescent realization of romance and you can read a lot more into that if you like. I prefer the chaste impression of two kids for whom a kiss is the most sexual idea in the world.

Many films have attempted to capture the essence of that transition from adolescence into puberty, but few films are this successful. Entirely through the use of metaphor, Peter Pan is more true to the confusing emotions and careening hormones of puberty than most films that tackle the subject head on.

To top it off the film also is one of the best looking films of the year. The special effects and production design are as spectacular as anything you've seen this year and bring even more magic to this already magical story. Credit Cinematographer Donald McAlpine and Production Designer Roger Ford with fully realizing Neverland like never before.

At the helm of it all is Hogan who comes out of nowhere with a surprisingly confident rendering of this usual material. Hogan, with the help of Michael Goldenberg, also tackled the adaptation of the screenplay giving the whole production an unexpectedly auteurist vision.

The acting by these novice young actors is also spot on, especially young Rachel Hurd Wood who is spectacular as Wendy. She brings some amazing, unspeakable quality to Wendy that I can't quite put my finger on. Call it star quality or presence, whatever it is, it's something special. She and Jeremy Sumpter, best known for his work in 2002's Frailty, have a chemistry that many adult acting pairs would envy.

This film is a terrific surprise. An exciting, visually spectacular family film. A film that never panders and never pulls back from its rich subtext the way most cookie cutter Hollywood films in the same vein do. This is a film for the whole family, a story that will entrance children with its safe but exciting action and entertain adults with its rich subtext and storytelling. Peter Pan is one of the best films of the year.

Movie Review The Company

The Company (2003) 

Directed by Robert Altman 

Written by Barbara Turner 

Starring Neve Campbell, Malcolm McDowell, James Franco 

Release Date December 26th, 2003 

Published January 12th, 2004 

The appeal of Robert Altman has always been somewhat esoteric. Not since MASH in 1970 has Altman had a film that could be called a commercial success, yet he continues to work steadily turning out quality work every other year or so. The delightful Gosford Park was Oscar nominated which is one of the reasons why studios and financiers are always willing to take a chance on him. Altman's work always has a prestigious feel as if just because he directed it the film has a shot at an Oscar. Altman's latest work, the ballet drama The Company has that same air of prestige to it but lacks the narrative coherence and sharpness of wit that made Gosford Park an Oscar nominee.

Neve Campbell stars in The Company as Loretta Ryan, Ry to her friends and family. Ry is a rising star at the Joffrey Ballet in Chicago where the manic artistic director Alberto Antonelli or Mr. A as he's called (Malcolm McDowell) runs a somewhat out of control ship. Managing everyday on the edge of financial chaos, and more importantly the ego chaos of his stars, Mr. A must train his dancers and hold financiers at bay all the while flitting in and out rooms to avoid serious confrontations.

Ry has just broken up with one of the dancers in the chorus and is beginning a tentative romance with a chef at a local restaurant, Josh (James Franco). In one of the film's most fascinating scenes, set in a bar around a game of pool, Altman lays out Ry and Josh's courtship without words. The two communicate only with their eyes until the next scene when Ryan and Josh wake up next to each other in Ry's apartment. It's not entirely wordless, it's just that Altman has little interest in what the characters have to say to each other, he just wants it all implied and accepted so that he can get back to the ballet.

Aside from Ry, Josh and Mr. A, the cast is made up of the dancers from the real Joffrey Ballet in Chicago. Not actors by training, Altman smartly gives them little dialogue and defines them thinly as stereotypes and archetypes. There is the aging star who can no longer keep up with the younger dancers. There is the teenager with the superstar attitude, talent and stage father and then there are just members of the chorus who struggle to get by and fill in the background.

Altman's camera simply floats through this film without ever really settling on a story that interests him. This may be why there are so many extra plot strands that are begun and tossed aside. A sign that Altman was searching for a story to carry the plot but just never found one, thus he explores as many as he can and then cuts away to a practice or a performance to get away from the plots that just don't appeal to him. This makes the film feel rudderless, like a documentary without a voiceover narration to fill in the blanks of the plot.

The Company is a difficult film to explain. It has a conventional sound to it but Altman is not interested in any of the conventional elements of the script. He's not interested in the romance plot between Campbell and Franco. He is not interested in Mr. A's struggles to raise money and manage his ego backstage. Really he's not interested in anything that isn't happening on the stage.

I cannot speak for Mr. Altman but I got the feeling that he received a rather conventional drama script with romance and the backstage drama of a ballet troupe and decided to do the film despite not being interested in the script. Altman simply sets up his camera and lets it fall on whatever grabs his eye, meanwhile in the corners of the screen behind overlapping, extraneous dialogue there is a conventional Hollywood film going on with a three act script and average dialogue. Altman sets up his camera on a rolling tripod and then walks away to await the next performance on the stage.

Not being a fan of ballet I am in no position to judge whether the performances in the film are any good. We can assume that since these are real dancers for a real and well respected ballet company that they must be pretty good. I can say that Neve Campbell looked pretty good. Campbell conceived the idea for the film and co-wrote the screenplay with Barbara Turner. Campbell does her own dancing in the film and seems to hold her own opposite the pros. Campbell is particularly good in an outdoor performance early in the film. As rain, lightning and thunder kick up she and her partner continue their performance all the way to the end despite the weather.

In the end Robert Altman comes off as a dilettante whose fan interest in ballet overcame his ability to tell a compelling story. That said, I feel there is something deeper in The Company. Indeed Altman seems to really love ballet to the point of ignoring everything else but there is a unique element of experiment here that is interesting. A risky attempt to make a film with as little plot as possible, a minimalist anti-narrative that is antithetical to anything Hollywood would be willing to make. In that sense I find Altman's approach appealing though not the final product of that approach.

Movie Review: Big Fish

Big Fish (2003) 

Directed by Tim Burton 

Written by John August 

Starring Ewan McGregor, Albert Finney, Billy Crudup, Jessica Lange, Steve Buscemi, Alison Lohman, Marion Cotillard, Danny Devito 

Release Date December 10th, 2003 

Published December 9th, 2003 

Tim Burton is a grand storyteller with a painter’s eye for color and depth. His films are often beautifully rendered and smartly written, a very rare combination. When his talent is fully engaged, as it was on his masterpieces Edward Scissorhands and Sleepy Hollow, he is an auteur that ranks with the all time greats. 

However, there are occasions when Burton seems less than engaged with his material, such as in his blockbuster works Planet Of The Apes and Batman Returns. His latest effort, Big Fish, looks like his kind of material but has moments when Burton doesn't feel fully committed to what is onscreen.

Ewan McGregor and Albert Finney portray Edward Bloom at two very different times in the man’s life. McGregor is the upstart Edward having grand adventures on his way to being something big. Finney's Edward is an old man on his deathbed, endless recalling the exploits of his young self.  Edward's son Will (Billy Crudup) has heard all of his father’s wild tales over and over again since he was a child. Now as his father's life is coming to an end, Will longs to know the truth. Instead, all he gets are more wild stories.

These dream sequences of young Edward Bloom are the kind of wild fantasies that Burton feels perfectly at home in. These stories include a real life giant played by Matthew McGrory, a circus with an eccentric ringleader (Danny Devito) and a city lost in time where there are no streets, just grass, and no one wears shoes. All of the stories are told with a magical veneer and there is slight sheen over the picture in these scenes that add to the dream imagery.

The central story to the flashbacks is Edward's romance with his wife Sandra, played by Alison Lohman and Jessica Lange. The romance is sweet, sincere and lovingly old fashioned and easily the film’s strongest subplot. What surrounds that story however, is somewhat unsatisfying.  We in the audience are like Edward's son, looking for a little bit of the real Edward Bloom. Listening to Albert Finney wheeze through a flashback setup, its not hard to see why Will is so exasperated with his father.

For his part Tim Burton isn't all that invested in his non-flashback scenes, preferring to put his artistic focus on the fantasy elements of the film. He seems to treat the other stuff as filler that give the flashbacks just enough context to get by. This makes for half of a very satisfying film.

The dreamlike fantasy flashbacks are artfully crafted fantasy, eye candy, humor and beauty. Unfortunately the other scenes, the non-fantasy scenes, are unsatisfying melodrama and good deal of screen chewing by Albert Finney. Billy Crudup does his best to ground these scenes, doing so well that he darn near saves the film with a terrific scene that takes place in a hospital room. It's a touching scene but not enough for me to give Big Fish a full recommendation. It’s not bad but this is not Burton at his best.

Movie Review: Cheaper by the Dozen

Cheaper by the Dozen (2003) 

Directed by Shawn Levy 

Written by Sam Harper, Joel Cohen, Alec Sokolow 

Starring Steve Martin, Paula Marshall, Richard Jenkins, Bonnie Hunt, Tom Welling, Hillary Duff

Release Date December 25th, 2003 

Published December 21st, 2003

I should have seen this coming. The warning signs were there. A preview screening nearly a month before the film’s release. A script adaptation credited to eight--yes, I said eight--writers. And a director who aspires to mediocrity because mediocre would be an improvement over what he's done before. Nevertheless, I still happily attended the screening of Cheaper By The Dozen because I thought Steve Martin can't possibly make a film that bad. I could not have been more wrong.

The plot description for this film is somewhat difficult because it's essentially a series of sub-sitcom level moments of family comedy. Martin stars as a football coach in a small Illinois town. He and his wife, played by Bonnie Hunt (also one of the eight credited writers), are unique because they were high school sweethearts who have been married for 22 years, and they have 12 children. Their family farm house is an absolute mess of toys and small animals and sporting equipment. Meanwhile, each of the kids have a handy little quirk to help us tell them apart. The archetypes are classic ABC TGIF kids: the tomboy, the prissy one, the really smart one, the fat kid and so on and so forth. It saves the time of having to write 12 individual characters.

The plot, such as it is, has Martin's character accepting a new job at a big college. So, the family packs up and moves to a Chicago suburb where they meet their neighbors, played by Alan Ruck and Paula Marshall. (Poor Marshall has the thankless task of playing the only-in-the-movies type of bitch character that says horribly insensitive things and will get her comeuppance by the end of the film.) However Marshall isn't nearly as abused as poor Richard Jenkins. Slumming from his role as the coolest dead guy on TV on HBO's Six Feet Under, Jenkins play Martin's best friend and new boss who is required to be inhumanly stupid. It is poor Mr. Jenkins’ character who forces Martin to choose between his job and his 12 kids. Well golly, what do you think he will choose?

Hunt's character writes a book about her family that lands on the bestseller list, forcing her to leave the family for a few days for a book tour. Golly, do you think dad can handle taking care of all of those kids by himself? I don't know about you, but I think we’re in for hijinks here. The kids trash a neighbor’s birthday party by accidentally releasing a snake in the house. Again it's poor Marshall who takes the brunt of that beating.

Oh it gets worse.

Teen stars Hillary Duff and Tom Welling play the family's two older children. In adjusting to their new high school, these two actors who look like fashion models are required by the script to be outcasts at their new school. It reminded me of the movie She's All That where Rachel Leigh Cook was considered a nerd because she wore glasses and baggy clothes, except that Welling and Duff never look like anything but the Gap models they are in real life.

Martin stretches and strains all over the screen trying to make this forced, stupid material work and the strain shows in every moment of the film. If you thought his Bringing Down The House character was forced, you will be shocked that this character is actually worse.

Director Shawn Levy cut his teeth on Nickelodeon and Disney Channel TV series’ until getting his big break directing 2003's very first worst movie of the year, Just Married. So how fitting that he should bookend 2003 with its final worst movie of the year. Cheaper By The Dozen is an awful movie. A sub-Brady Bunch sitcom, full of forced jokes and cheap contrived melodrama.

In the words of my hero, Roger Ebert, who used this phrase to sum up his feelings about the film North, "I HATED, HATED, HATED, HATED, HATED THIS MOVIE".

Movie Review House of Sand and Fog

House of Sand and Fog (2003) 

Directed by Vadim Perelman 

Written by Shawn Lawrence Otto, Vadim Perelman

Starring Ben Kingsley, Shoreh Aghdashloo, Jennifer Connelly, Frances Fisher, Ron Eldard

Release Date December 19th, 2003 

Published December 17th, 2003 

This time of year we hear a lot of talk about so-called prestige pictures. Art films with opulent production design, heavy on the period detail and generally perceived as over the head of the average filmgoer. With a title like House of Sand and Fog, a pedigree that involves the adaptation of a National Book Award finalist and a starring duo of Oscar winners, it's not surprising that the perception of prestige is all over this film. Look deeper however, and you find a surprisingly populist picture. An Oprah Book Club selection and a bestseller. Also, you’ll find a story that is very compelling even if it is over the head of many filmgoers.

Jennifer Connelly stars as Kathy Lazaro, a recovering alcoholic and drug abuser who's only asset in the world is the home left to her by her late father. That however is taken from her when the city government sends cops to her home to evict her over a tax debt. The debt is bogus but unfortunately, Kathy hasn't bothered to open her mail in weeks and thus it will take months to sort out the problem.

In the meantime, her home is quickly sold to an Iranian immigrant, a former Colonel in the Iranian army named Amir Behrani (Ben Kingsley). The Colonel and his family, wife Nadi (Shohreh Aghdashloo) and son Esmail (Jonathan Adhout), see the home as a mirror of their home in Iran that was on the coast of the Caspian Sea. Amir also sees it as an investment that, if fixed up, could be resold for three times its worth.

With the help of a legal aid lawyer played by Frances Fisher, Kathy is working to get her house back. After some back and forth wrangling, it's agreed that if Kathy can convince the Behrani's to sell the house back to the city for what he paid, then they can give it back to Kathy. Meanwhile, Kathy is being cared for by one of the cops who helped her move out, Deputy Lester Burdon (Ron Eldard). In a short time, the deputy has fallen for Kathy, has left his wife and family to care for her, and is willing to risk his job to help her get the house back.

All of this mundanely sets the table for some very compelling drama well strung together by Writer-Director Vadim Perelman. Having adapted a book by Andre Dubus, Perelman lends the story a visual style that evokes the title of the film without being heavy handed. The title is a double metaphor that ties the story together.

The performances of Ben Kingsley and Jennifer Connelly are the strong points of the film and the Oscar winners are once again award-worthy. Kingsley is especially powerful as the deposed Colonel. Prone to violent outbursts and amazing compassion all brought about by his deep, religious faith. For a good portion of the film, he seems to be the villain but as the film winds to it's inevitably tragic conclusion, Kingsley's performance becomes the emotional center of the film and draws tears without forcing them.

As for Connelly, she is every bit as strong as Kingsley is, She infuses Kathy with the sadness and longing that wins our sympathy even as she acts in less than likable fashion. Her performance is all the stronger for having to carry the lunkheaded Ron Eldard as her love interest. Eldard plays Lester as the dumbest cop on the force. His performance is the weakest of the film and unfortunately, somewhat pivotal near the end. Thankfully, the film does not collapse because of him. Props to Director Perelman for getting the film to its astonishing and powerful finale even as Eldard's performance sinks.

Be sure to bring your antidepressants because as one of my fellow critics said after the screening, House of Sand and Fog may be the most depressing film of the year. Indeed, there is very little light in the film. It works because even depressing emotion can be cathartic and House earns it's awesomely cathartic and emotional ending. The label prestige picture is well earned by this emotional film.

Movie Review Stuck on You

Stuck on You (2003) 

Directed by The Farrelly Brothers 

Written by The Farrelly Brothers

Starring Matt Damon, Greg Kinnear, Cher, Eva Mendes, Seymour Cassell, Dane Cook, Lin Shaye, Bella Thorne 

Release Date December 12th, 2003

Published December 11th, 2003 

The Farrelly Brothers signature had always been juvenile grossout humor tinged with sweetness. With Shallow Hal, they seemed somewhat tame in the gross stuff. Now with their latest film Stuck On You, they seem to have moved beyond the grossout humor completely. What's really surprising however is that they prove just how much they don't need it anymore. This funny, sweet and unusual comedy about conjoined twins is some of the best work the Brothers have done since There's Something About Mary.

Walt (Greg Kinnear) and Bob (Matt Damon) were born attached by a single liver so dangerously small that doctors don't believe they can be separated. Thus the two have gone through life together playing sports, dating and running a restaurant on Martha's Vineyard where friends and family have come to completely accept the boys as they are.

Walt has recently become restless. His ambition has always been to be an actor and his one man shows at the community theater have all been well reviewed, even as poor Bob suffered from severe stage fright. Walt wishes to go to Hollywood and despite his reservations, Bob finally relents. The two leave behind their comfortable surroundings for the big city and Walt's shot at the big time.

Once in Hollywood it's not long until Walt hits the big time with a role opposite Cher on a CSI-esque show. All is not as it seems however, as Cher has hand selected Walt to be on the show in hopes that his being a conjoined twin will get the show canceled. Much to Cher's dismay, Walt turns out to be a hit and the producers find it easy to hide Bob behind props and with special effects. Even after their secret gets out, Walt becomes an even bigger hit.

As for Walt, moving to Los Angeles offers him the chance to meet his internet pen pal May (Wenn Yann Shih) who does not know he is conjoined. This leads to rather obvious jokes as Walt and Bob date May, with the help of an actress friend from their apartment complex April (Eva Mendes) coming along as Walt's date. The joke is obvious but the actors play it so well that it's easy to overlook that.

Naturally the subjects of surgery to separate themselves come up and these scenes are really terrific. I love how the film explains the age difference between Kinnear and Damon along with various other physiological complications. All of it handled without falling back on grossout humor but with the Farrelly Brothers other signature, sweet-natured ridiculousness. Both Bob and Walt are typical, delightfully clueless Farrelly characters who can't imagine why anyone would find them unusual.

The cast is terrific from top to bottom. Kinnear and Damon have a terrific chemistry with Damon really surprising us with his comic talent. You expect Kinnear to have great comic timing as he showed on TV's Talk Soup and the movie Sabrina. For Damon however, though he showed terrific humility in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, this is his first full-length comedic performance and I was surprised how well he pulled it off.

The supporting cast is every bit the equal of the leads with Eva Mendes really standing out. Her bubble-headed actress April provides some of the biggest laughs of the film with her ditzy reactions to the twins’ condition. The way she just thinks that the twins being connected is totally natural is priceless and part of the film’s charm. Cher is also good, perfectly willing to make herself the joke in what is her biggest acting role in a while. Watch out for a pair of terrific cameos as well, Meryl Streep shows up near the end and brings the house down.

The film is not as funny as Kingpin or as sweet as There's Something About Mary but Stuck On You proves that with or without shocking the audience with sight gags, the Farrelly brothers are just plain funny.

Movie Review Something's Gotta Give

Something's Gotta Give (2003) 

Directed by Nancy Meyers

Written by Nancy Meyers 

Starring Jack Nicholson, Diane Keaton, Keanu Reeves, Frances McDormand, Amanda Peet, Jon Favreau

Release Date December 12th, 2003 

Published December 11th, 2003 

A strange thing can happen to an actor when they get almost too good at what they do. Audiences no longer perceive what they do as a performance. Jack Nicholson is one of those actors with that wonderful problem. After years of showing off that roguish, untamable charm, many people believe that is the man in real Life. Nicholson's personal life, from a tabloid perspective, does nothing to change that perception. Nicholson's new film Something's Gotta Give, co-starring Diane Keaton, and directed by Nancy Meyers, slyly plays to Jack's perception and then against it to terrific romantic and comedic effect.

Nicholson stars as Harry Sanborn, a record company owner with a fetish for younger woman. Specifically, Harry only goes for woman under 30. His latest little twinkie is Marin Berry (Amanda Peet) who brings Harry to her mother's beach house in the Hamptons for a romantic weekend. Unfortunately, she didn't know her mother, Erica (Keaton), would be there, leading to an awkward meeting in the kitchen between Erica and Harry in his underwear.

From there, things go from bad to worse after a disastrous dinner. Harry and Marin retire to the bedroom and Harry has a heart attack. On the orders of doctors, Harry can't travel and must stay at the beach house, even though Marin is returning to the city. Left alone, Harry and Erica bicker in your traditional romantic comedy fashion until they find a little common ground, and after Harry accidentally catches Erica in the nude. This begins a romantic series of events that aren't what you expect.

This being a romantic comedy, there must be arbitrary roadblocks to keep the lovers apart. One of those is Harry's doctor, played by Keanu Reeves, who takes an interest in Erica. Others are less obvious and are played as emotional roadblocks but are really choices that are made according to the needs of the script.

Director Nancy Meyers knows her chick flicks, having directed Mel Gibson in the blockbuster What Woman Want. Meyers knows the right comic beats to hit and how to get what she wants from her actors. That said, she brings little else to the table as a director. Meyers must rely heavily on the skill of her actors to carry off the material and lucky for her, she is truly blessed in Something's Gotta Give.

To watch a pair of pro's like Nicholson and Keaton fall in love onscreen is a true joy and while not all of the situations the characters find themselves in work, these two brilliant actors make a good deal of them work. Most of the best comedic moments in the film are played with merely a sideways glance, a skill that you just can't teach.

The first half of Something's Gotta Give plays off of what you expect of Jack Nicholson, that free swinging playboy reputation that will follow him for the rest of his life. However, once the two leads are left alone, the film becomes more about Keaton's wonderfully neurotic Erica. A playwright, Erica begins writing her moments with Harry into her latest play leading up to one of the film’s great gags on the set of the play just before it opens.

Something's Gotta Give has elements of your typical romantic comedy, a few too many of those elements for my taste. It wants to be insightful about romance in the later years of life and aging in general but its tone is a little too light for any real insight. What the film has going for it is two terrific actors who never seem to have peaked even as they get older. For that reason, I recommend Something's Gotta Give.

Movie Review Love Don't Cost a Thing

Love Don't Cost A Thing (2003) 

Directed by Troy Beyer 

Written by Troy Beyer 

Starring Nick Cannon, Christina Milian, Steve Harvey, Kenan Thompson, Kal Penn

Release Date December 12th, 2003 

Published December 12th, 2003  

Of all of the movies that I thought deserved another take, the dopey Patrick Dempsey teen comedy Can’t Buy Me Love never occurred to me. Despite being an iconic 80’s film for many, to me its a slight comedy about a nerd who buys his way into high school popularity had overtones of outright prostitution. I would have preferred to welcome its fall into 80’s obscurity. The ever unoriginal Hollywood swill factory however disagreed with my assessment and thus we have Love Don’t Cost A Thing, a cynical “urban” (read black) take on the story.

Nick Cannon, star of last year’s drumming drama Drumline, stars as Alvin Johnson. Alvin is a high school nerd who spends his time with his nerdy friends rebuilding cars and dreaming of what it would be like to have access to the popular kid’s hallway of their high school. Yes, the high school has a hallway where the rich, popular bullies and their hot girlfriends are separated from the rabble, indicating that even the high school teachers are in on this anti-nerd conspiracy.

Alvin’s dream girl is a popular cheerleader named Paris Morgan (Christina Milian) whose current boyfriend is an NBA star who jumped directly from high school to the NBA. Paris has no occasion to ever speak to Alvin until one night when she borrows her mother’s car and crashes it while arguing on the phone with her boyfriend. While getting the car looked at Paris finds that her mother will find out about the accident unless the car is fixed immediately. Enter Alvin with his car expertise and just enough of his own money to pay for the parts. In exchange for fixing the car, Paris will be Alvin’s girl and in the process help him become popular.

What a shock it is then when the plan succeeds and popularity goes to young Alvin’s head. Alvin drops his nerdy friends, begins wearing trendy clothes and a new hairstyle and before long, Alvin surpasses Paris in his high school stature. Do you think he has a comeuppance in his future? For his part, Nick Cannon affects a nerdy black kid better than I expected. That said, the part as written has him changing rather unconvincingly from Urkel to Puff Daddy and only the Urkel part works. Cannon is a charisma-challenged actor who has yet to show a spark of the stardom that has seemed thrust upon him in the past year since the debut of his Nickelodeon kids show in 2002.

Pop starlet Christina Milian equates herself better than expected, though expectations place her just ahead of Britney Spears on the pop-tart-turned-actress-chart well behind the far more accomplished Mandy Moore. The part as written by director Troy Miller affects depth by having Paris write bad poetry and play the guitar. She also bemoans popularity as a job rather than a mere social status, an interesting idea that goes nowhere.

Director Troy Beyer adapted the screenplay of Can’t Buy Me Love, written by Michael Swerdlick. The word adaptation is used loosely. She essentially just traces within the lines of the original film, changing only minor plot points and the ethnicity of the characters.

Therein lies the most insidious problem of the film. The retrofitting of this unoriginal idea for African American audiences is a sad cynical attempt to capitalize on the paucity of films with African-American lead characters. Because there are so few films with black, lead characters, African-American audiences are prone to support any film that features a black face. This has caused Hollywood’s cynical mass marketing machine to continue to limit opportunities for African-Americans in order to maintain them as a niche market. Assuming they are willing to accept cheap, easy to market trash like Love Don’t Cost A Thing at the expense of more challenging, artistic films with African-American lead casts.

Such cynicism is nothing new from Hollywood but when it deals with race, it becomes far more serious. A film as slight as Love Don’t Cost A Thing doesn’t have any kind of social agenda in its creation. Rather, it has one thrust upon it because there are so few films with predominantly African American casts and even fewer good ones. That is not due to a lack of talented African-American filmmakers but rather due to cheap knock offs and shortsighted money grubbing of the kind that creates movies like Love Don't Cost A Thing. 

Movie Review Honey

Honey (2003) 

Directed by Billie Woodruff

Written by Kim Watson

Starring Jessica Alba, Mekhi Pfifer, Joy Bryan, Lil Romeo

Release Date December 5th, 2003 

Published December 6th, 2003 

The TV series Dark Angel is one of my all-time favorites. I videotaped each episode and now have them all on DVD. I stopped short of getting the barcode tattoo on the back of my neck; I'm a fan but I'm not crazy. That said, when I first saw the trailer for Honey I wasn't as excited to see Jessica Alba as I should have been, probably because I could see the film’s formula construction from a mile away. Poor inner city girl makes good leaves behind friends and family to find success and is burned before returning to her roots. Sadly, seeing the film confirmed my feelings.

Alba is Honey Daniels, a wannabe video dancer who dreams of shaking her stuff in hip-hop videos. For now, she subsists by working as a bartender, working part-time in a record store, and teaching hip-hop dancing at a community center run by her stock, disapproving mother (played by Lonette McKee.) Honey finally gets a shot at her dream when a music video director plucks her out of the club where she parties with her best friend Gina (a stunningly hot Joy Bryant).

The director is Michael Ellis (David Moscow), a smarmy white guy who acts the part of a stereotypical black person to ingratiate himself with the artists whose videos he directs. Honey is conveniently oblivious to the fact that Michael likes her for more than her dance steps. Honey may be distracted by the more attractive advances of a neighborhood barber named Chaz (Mekhi Phifer), who woos her with his integrity as much as with his charm.

Honey is also distracted by attempting to help a pair of inner-city youngsters, Benny (Rapper Lil’ Romeo) and his little brother Raymond (cute-as-a-button Zachary Williams). The kids are terrific little dancers who come from an abusive home and are skirting the edges of a drug-dealing gang. Honey hopes that getting them in a music video could help them stay straight but when she rebuffs the director’s advances, the video is called off and the kids are back on the street.

This story requires Moscow's video director to act immensely irrational in a role that is already beyond grating because of his gangsta posing. Just once, I would like to see this stock characterization reversed. This character accepts the rejection and becomes a supportive friend instead of an over-the-top mustache-twirling villain. Just once.

This formula is so familiar that even lines of dialogue can be recited by rote. Director Billie Woodruff (a former music video director) brings only better music to this formula. Directing as if the film were only a clothesline from which to hang a soundtrack album, Honey parades a number of well-known hip-hop artists past the camera for cameos. Blaque, Jadakiss and Ginuwine have unmemorable screen time, while Missy Elliot steals the movie with her two scenes that take up little more than five minutes on screen. I wouldn't mind seeing Missy get her own film.

For her part, Alba is, at the very least, very committed to her formula role. She infuses Honey with sweetness and tenderness that sells her character’s best qualities. However, when forced by the script, she becomes merely a pawn of the god-awful plot machinations. Her forced obliviousness to the director’s amorous advances are laughable, right up until she finally figures it out. Her romance with Phifer's Chaz is believable because both actors are attractive and look good together. Phifer is slumming big time with this lightweight material; his charisma and presence deserve a far better film.

This poor-kid-makes-good formula is as old as film itself, but has taken on a more insidious quality as Hollywood has moved into its pre-packaged, assembly-line era of filmmaking. Honey is the type of film that can be mass produced and recycled to endless degrees and has been. Sadly it will be again. As I love to point out, Honey is yet another Hollywood movie that had a poster before it had a script. God help us.

Movie Review Timeline

Timeline (2003)

Directed by Richard Donner 

Written by George Nolfi, Jeff Maguire

Starring Paul Walker, Frances O'Connor, Gerard Butler, Billy Connelly, David Thewlis, Anna Friel, Michael Sheen, Ethan Embry, Martin Csokas

Release Date November 26th, 2003 

Published November 26th, 2003 

It's been five years since director Richard Donner last stepped behind a camera. That was for the deathly Lethal Weapon 4, a creaky cash grab of an action movie that made even the indomitable Mel Gibson look bad. In fact, it has been nearly 10 years since Donner has directed a good movie, 1994's Maverick (also with Gibson.) In his comeback, adapting Michael Crichton's time traveling novel, Timeline, Donner continues the downward slide of his once great career.

Paul Walker stars as Chris, the son of archaeologist Professor Edward Johnston (Billy Connelly). When the professor disappears on a job, his son and his crew of archaeology students including Marek (Gerard Butler), David (Ethan Embry) and Kate (Frances O'Conner) must follow his clues to find him. The Professor's last job was working for a mysterious corporation called ITC. The corporation’s scientists have figured a way to send human beings back in time but only to one specific location: Castleberg, France in the 14th century on the eve of war between the French and British.

Well, wouldn't you these students just happen to be experts in that exact era? In fact they are excavating that very battlefield. What an amazing coincidence. ITC has sent the Professor back to the 14th century and now want to send Chris and company back there to find him and bring him back. Oh but if it were that easy, we wouldn't have a movie. Accompanied by a shady military guy played by Neal McDonough and his two soon-to-be-dead lackeys, the gang has six hours to find the professor and get back to the future.

For Donner, working entirely on autopilot, the time travel plot is merely a clothesline on which to hang one lame action sequence after another. The action has the period authenticity of a high school production of Shakespeare. When we aren't being annoyed with the lame action scene, we are treated to plot points that screenwriters Jeff Maguire and George Nolfi obviously thought were clever. The script ham-handedly sets up things in the present that will payoff in the past. When the supposed payoffs come, the actors practically scream, "see how this paid off, wow aren't we clever.”

Some of the plot points pay off so obviously you can't help but giggle at the goofiness of it all. The actors react like children who just discovered a light switch and want to explain to the audience how it works.

For his part, Walker turns in yet another young Keanu Reeves impression. All that is missing is the signature "Whoa." Walker looks about as comfortable in period garb as Dom Deluise would in a thong. The rest of the cast isn't much better, especially a slumming Frances O'Connor as Walker's love interest. O'Connor was so good in Spielberg's A.I that scripts like this should be easy to pass on but somehow, here she is.

Donner's best days are clearly behind him. The man who made Lethal Weapon and Lethal Weapon II, arguably the best buddy movie franchise ever, and the man who made arguably the best superhero movie of all time--Superman with Christopher Reeve--has now settled into a depressing groove of just simply picking up his check and turning out below-average action movies that make for great posters but not much else.

Movie Review The Haunted Mansion

The Haunted Mansion (2003) 

Directed by Rob Minkoff 

Written by David Berenbaum 

Starring Eddie Murphy, Terence Stamp, Wallace Shawn, Jennifer Tilly 

Release Date November 26th, 2003 

Published November 25th, 2003 

It may be time to finally put our memories of Eddie Murphy 'comic genius' away for good. It seems we will never see Murphy's talent ever again. With every mediocre family movie in which he picks up an eight figure paycheck, the Eddie Murphy of our memory dies a little. Eddie can't go and make an edgy, raunchy, action comedy anymore because it might cost him his next family movie paycheck. With his latest mediocre family movie, The Haunted Mansion, Murphy pounds yet another nail into the coffin of his former comic persona.

In The Haunted Mansion, which is based on the Disney theme park ride, Murphy is real estate maven Jim Evers of Evers and Evers Real Estate. The family's cringe-inducing catchphrase is “Evers and Evers making your family happy for Evers and Evers.” Yikes. In an all too familiar plot, Jim works way too much, and his wife Sara (Marsha Tomason) is upset that he doesn't spend enough time with the kids, daughter Megan (Aree Davis) and son Michael (Marc John Jeffries).

To that end, Jim proposes a family trip to the lake with no work at all for the entire weekend. No work until a new client comes calling with a huge property to sell. It's a gothic 1800s mansion called Gracie Manor and if the Evers want the listing they have to come immediately. In what is supposed to be a quick detour from their trip, the family stops at Gracie Manor to meet the owner and wind up spending the night with ghosts, zombies, and various other horror movie staples.

The ghosts in the Haunted Mansion are Master Gracie (Nathaniel Parker) and his staff, headed up by Ramsley (Terrence Stamp) the butler and his assistants played by Wallace Shawn and Dina Spybey. Jennifer Tilly also shows up as a gypsy in magic ball. The ghosts of Gracie Manor can only escape if their curse is lifted and the vagaries of the curse involve a woman who looks exactly like Sara Evers. When Sara is captured by the ghosts, it's up to Jim to save her and find some other way to lift the curse.

Eddie Murphy, as he does even in his worst films, shows flashes of the kind of comedy we know he's capable of. Murphy remains charismatic and occasionally that comic spark comes back. But sadly, for the most part, Eddie Murphy in The Haunter Mansion is in pick up a check mode. Murphy's Jim Evers is a bumbling scaredy cat channeling Abbott & Costello meet Frankenstein, until it's time for him to save the day. That might not sound bad but Murphy's strength is not being Abbott or Costello and his idea of broad physical comedy is forced and unpleasant. 

Poor Terrence Stamp looks, in every scene, as if he can barely keep from rolling his eyes. Stamp's boredom with this lame material is evident in his every gesture, facial expression and line of dialogue. Like Murphy, he's not here to make The Haunted Mansion good, he's here to get his paycheck and go do something else. This is a feeling that permeates the entirety of The Haunted Mansion, a complete disinterest in actually making a good movie. 

Director Rob Minkoff is one of those studio hacks that Disney keeps on the payroll just for movies like this: Mediocre, inoffensive family comedies that need merely to transfer script to screen. Minkoff shows little directorial flair in The Haunted Mansion. It's likely he could spend his entire career turning out mediocre hits like this one or another Stuart Little movie. The Haunted Mansion is not an offensively bad movie. Merely a mediocre movie. Of course I've often wondered just which is worse, mediocre or just plain bad.

Movie Review Love Actually

Love, Actually 2003 

Directed by Richard Curtis

Written by Richard Curtis 

Starring Hugh Grant, Emma Thompson, Alan Rickman, Colin Firth, Liam Neeson, Keira Knightley

Release Date November 7th, 2003 

Published November 4th, 2003 

In Hollywood, the romantic comedy has been beaten to death by clichés and predictable, cookie-cutter plotting. For fans of the genre, our only solace comes when Working Title Films out of Britain releases yet another ingeniously witty, romantic comedy written by Richard Curtis. The man wrote Four Weddings and A Funeral and Notting Hill, and adapted the screenplay for Bridget Jones's Diary. Now, stepping behind the camera for the first time, Curtis shows he could be an industry all to himself writing and directing hit romantic comedies forever. His seemingly endless wit is once again on display in Love Actually, an epic romance if only for the names in its cast.

There are so many different actors and plots in Love Actuallythat it's difficult to condense, so I will lay out the best of the numerous plots individually. Hugh Grant has the best part as the newly-elected British Prime Minister. The film is set apparently sometime in the near future and there are some very funny moments where the script takes loving shots at current real-life Prime Minister Tony Blair. 

As the new prime minister prepares for the arrival of the American President, he begins a flirtation with his tea server Natalie (newcomer Martine McCutcheon). Curtis does an excellent job in balancing the job of prime minister with the script’s flights of romantic fantasy. When the American President arrives, a priceless cameo that I won't spoil, Grant's Prime Minister is allowed to have a point of view on world politics, especially Britain's perceived position as America's bitch, where less courageous directors would have glossed over any actual politics.

Laura Linney has another terrific part as a shy American transplant who is constantly glued to her cell phone. She is nursing a serious crush on one of her co-workers, a crush that everyone in her office from her boss (Alan Rickman) to the bitchy secretary knows about. Even the object of her affection knows about her feelings but is waiting for her to act. This subplot is bittersweet because Linney has a secret that is linked to her constantly ringing cell phone. It's another great piece of work by Linney who has long been one of my favorite actresses.

The most romantic of all the plots involves Colin Firth as a writer who moves away to France after finding his wife cheating with his brother. After moving into his French villa, he hires a maid named Aurelia (Lucia Moniz). The two have an interesting working relationship because Aurelia is Portuguese and doesn't speak a word of English. Their attempts at communicating are sweet and funny moments of misunderstanding. This plot shouldn't work but it does because of the subtle complicated work of Colin Firth. The plot is rushed and predictable but Firth is so winning you can't help but cheer for his happiness.

That is only a minor brushing of the characters in Love Actually, each of the characters I already mentioned have connections to other characters who have their own subplots. Emma Thompson plays Rickman's wife who wonders if her husband is cheating on her. Liam Neeson shows up as a widower left to raise a 10 year old stepson. Keira Knightley is a newlywed who has a secret admirer who happens to be her husband's best man. Bill Nighy plays an aging rocker, modeled on Mick Jagger, whose awful Christmas song plays throughout the film. The song, a holiday reworking of the pop standard “Love Is All Around '' is intentionally bad and Nighy's character freely admits it and his honesty makes the song defiantly a hit.

And there are still more plots I don't have the time or patience to describe. The cast is unwieldy but Curtis finds an almost awe-inspiring way of giving each time to develop and be resolved in ways that are satisfying and funny. Towards the end, just when you think there is no way to resolve all of these plot strands Curtis returns to a piece of dialogue from Hugh Grant's opening voiceover and uses it to unite the entire cast and make a grand point about the nature of love and life. It's a work of subtle brilliance that will cause audience members to leave the theater smiling at the conclusion of the film.

This is a wonderfully exuberant film filled with music, love, and romance that is never saccharine. That wonderful British wit is always in place and keeps the plot from spilling over into super sweetness. Something about the British accent that makes even the most wildly over-the-top flights of fancy seem smart and meaningful. This is one excellent romantic comedy from the last group of producers, director, and actors that can do it right.

Movie Review Shattered Glass

Shattered Glass (2003) 

Directed by Billy Ray 

Written by Billy Ray 

Starring Hayden Christensen, Peter Sarsgard, Chloe Sevigny, Rosario Dawson, Hank Azaria, Steve Zahn

Release Date October 31st, 2003 

Published October 30th, 2003 

The New Republic magazine prides itself as the in-flight magazine of Air Force One. Its pretentiousness has been earned by years of literate intelligent discourse on policy and international politics. Appreciate their perspective or not, you have to respect that they get into these subjects that so many average Americans think are boring.

So it was a huge black eye for the storied magazine to find out one of its writers had faked numerous stories. If there is one cardinal sin in journalism, it's lying, and Stephen Glass lied on a scale that dwarfs the lies of your average tabloid rag. The story of Glass's lies and how he was finally caught are the subject of the adroit and fascinating film Shattered Glass.

Hayden Christensen stars as Glass, the youngest writer on a staff whose median age is 26 years old. The 22-year-old Glass is a rising star with a habit of looking into fantastic stories. The stories occasionally raise suspicions but the puppy dog sweetness of Glass disarms co-workers who couldn't believe Steve would make up such a story. For the most part Stephen's stories check out, he has detailed notes and phone numbers from his subjects. Those subjects can tend to be unwieldy for fact checkers, but there is enough verifiable truth to what Stephen reports that the stories go through.

As the film progresses there is a very subtle shift of focus from the character Stephen Glass to the uncovering of Glass's deception, seen through the eyes of Peter Sarsgaard's New Republic Editor Chuck Lane. The shift is signaled almost unconsciously through scenes of Glass working late to cover his lies and Lane at home with his wife and daughter. These scenes allow the audience to choose sides without feeling bad for abandoning poor Stephen.

Coming to the story with a good knowledge of what Stephen Glass did and the type of person he is (his appearance on 60 Minutes earlier this year was the tip of the iceberg as to his serial compulsion toward hiding the truth), I never felt much of any sympathy for Glass. Thus, I came to Shattered Glass with my mind made up about the man and his crimes. There are however many people willing to like Glass as he's portrayed by the gifted Hayden Christensen. His Stephen Glass is a seemingly sweet natured glad hander who remembers everybody's birthday and offers to help you move without being asked.

I read another reviewer who was familiar with the real life players and who thought the film built up Chuck Lane as more pious than he ever truly was. I would disagree with that assessment in the context of the film. Perhaps the reviewer is too close to the real situation to consider the film. Lane as played by Peter Sarsgaard is merely a put-upon editor who happens to have a serious breach of journalistic ethics thrust in his lap. 

He rightfully despises Glass and his crimes and scenes early in the film establish the two characters at odds from the beginning. Personality-wise, it's not hard for me to dislike the serial glad-handing Glass and his childish reaction to anything critical. The character of Chuck Lane communicates a similar dislike throughout the film that makes angry outbursts near the end of the film nearly as personal as professional.

Few films have shone such a clear light on the journalistic process. How a piece goes from the reporter to the page and exactly how flawed that process can be if abused. First time director Billy Ray tells his story on two levels, getting to know the character of Stephen Glass and also showing us the behind the scenes action at a magazine. If only for a moment, it makes you consider all that goes into your favorite magazines.

What really stays with you after the film however is the performances of Hayden Christensen and Peter Sarsgaard, who perfectly inhabit their opposing characters. Christensen brings an almost creepy quality to the sweetness that so many people liked about the real Stephen Glass. That creepiness makes it that much easier to dislike him, and is important for audience members who don't understand how he did such a horrible thing. Sarsgaard, despite what others might say, never makes Chuck Lane into a journalistic crusader for ethics. He's a journalist and editor who is doing the right thing and has a righteous outrage toward Glass for the serious damage he did to the credibility of a magazine that made its reputation on credibility.

As a debut behind the camera, Billy Ray shows he knows how to tell a compelling story. His visual style doesn't leave much to the memory but this is a character piece and as such, it succeeds marvelously. Shattered Glass is one of the year’s best films.

Movie Review The Human Stain

The Human Stain (2003) 

Directed by Robert Benton 

Written by Nicholas Meyer 

Starring Anthony Hopkins, Nicole Kidman, Ed Harris, Gary Sinise 

Release Date October 31st, 2003 

Published November 4th, 2003 

This is truly one of the worst titles you've ever seen. It's made worse by the fact that it is only part metaphor and does in fact refer to the gutter-minded definition your so ashamed to ascribe it. In his 2000 novel The Human Stain, writer Phillip Roth makes it clear that his title refers to that infamous blue dress owned by Monica Lewinsky. Yes there is a deeper metaphorical meaning to the title for the books characters but it's the Monica definition that people come away with and in so doing, forget that there is a rather compelling drama behind that title.

For the film adaptation of Roth's novel, director Robert Benton may have been better off without the literal title. The film is all about the metaphor with little mention of Roth's contempt for the Clinton impeachment and to his book’s first act plot point. You shouldn't judge a book (or movie) by it's title but in this case it's hard not to. So many people will avoid seeing this film because of that title that it renders the whole thing meaningless.

Coleman Silk (Sir Anthony Hopkins) has, in his time as Dean of Classics at Berkshire College, turned the sleepy small town institution into the shadow of an Ivy League University. In so doing he has made many friends and many more enemies. Therefore, it's not surprising then that when he makes one seemingly minor mistake on the eve of his retirement that his enemies seize upon it to get rid of him early.

Coleman's mistake was referring to a pair of students who never showed up in his class as "spooks.” Coleman's reference was to the ghostly definition of the word but because the missing students were African-Americans a complaint was filed and some people seized on the other definition of the word spooks as a racial epithet. And so it is that the very people Coleman himself hired at the college that shove him out the door.

The controversy is ironic because Coleman himself is African-American though you would not know it to look at him. He has for most of his 71 years passed himself off as Jewish and because of his light skin has never had to admit to anyone he is black. Coleman never told his wife of more than 40 years or his colleagues at the college or his closest friend a writer, Nathan Zuckerman (Gary Sinise), who after Coleman's death must piece his life together from the scraps of lies and half truths he left behind.

Coleman's death is another great source of controversy. After quitting his job, losing his wife to an embolism and becoming a pariah in his small town, Coleman takes up a scandalous affair with Faunia Farley (Nicole Kidman) a woman half his age, divorced and working as a janitor at the college. Faunia's ex-husband Les (Ed Harris) is a Vietnam veteran and highly unstable.

The situation that Coleman has placed himself in is one that is obviously dangerous. It's a situation that someone of his dignity and intelligence should never find himself in, as his friends including Nathan and his Lawyer Nelson Primus (Clark Gregg) remind him constantly. However as Faunia tells him when they first meet, action is the enemy of thought. Coleman acts without thinking allowing lust to overcome logic. Whether or not Coleman and Faunia can achieve something beyond lust is one of the film’s central questions.

Parallel to the main love story is Coleman's history. Flashbacks take us back 50 years to when Coleman (played in the past by newcomer Wentworth Miller) first decided his life would be easier if lived as a white Jew. While attending school in New York City, Coleman meets a beautiful Midwestern blonde named Steena Paulson (Jacinda Barrett). Steena has no idea that Coleman is African-American, she assumes he is Jewish which explains his ethnic looks. It seems like true love but when Coleman brings Steena home to meet his mother, he gets his first lesson in why his life might be easier if he pretended he was someone else.

The backstory is actually far more interesting than the central love story. Wentworth Miller and Jacinda Barrett light up the screen with a fiery chemistry. Ms. Barrett is particularly surprising as she pulls off the wide-eyed innocence of a mid twentieth century Midwesterner. Until now she has been cast as sexpots, typecast from her time as a one the over-sexed simpletons on MTV's The Real World (she was in the London cast).

Of course, Sir Anthony Hopkins and Nicole Kidman make strong impressions, they are terrific actors. Their plot however is astoundingly dreary. Any momentary light that shines in their relationship is punished and it's only in the flashbacks to Coleman and Steena, before she dumped him, that we get any reprieve from the constant onslaught of misery.

Director Robert Benton has a knack for capturing older male characters preparing to conquer their old age. It was Benton who directed Paul Newman to his best late years performance in Nobody's Fool. Here he does well by Sir Anthony Hopkins by giving the legendary actor his first romantic lead role. Unfortunately, as great as Mr. Hopkins is, I never believed he and Wentworth Miller were playing the same character. After leaving his job at the college Coleman's connection to his past is left only as an ironic passage in his life. The film shifts it's focus to his relationship with Faunia which has nothing to do with race. It's an entirely different plot.

As for the allusion to the Lewinsky scandal, that was far more the book’s concern than the films. It is referred on more than one occasion and as in the book it is brought up as an example of political correctness run amok. It runs parallel to the ridiculousness of Coleman's own persecution for his racist remark that wasn't racist. Clinton's indiscretion was bad but not impeachable. 

The novel used Coleman and Faunia's many problems to magnify why Clinton-Lewinsky was such a meaningless endeavor, the movie makes the same reference and both seem heavy-handed to those of us who already realize what a bunch of trumped up ridiculousness Clinton-Lewinsky was. Of course issues of race, and death and family are more important than whether or not Bill Clinton got a BJ in the Oval Office. We know that! Thankfully the film doesn't linger on the point.

I would have liked to see more about Coleman growing up. Pretending to be white while coming of age in the 50's and 60’s with the rise of the Civil Rights movement, that has more inherent drama than any semi-controversial small town May-December romance ever could. Someday someone should revisit Roth's novel and extrapolate on the ideas put forth about Coleman's youth. That sounds like a movie I would like to see.

Movie Review Scary Movie 3

Scary Movie 3 (2003) 

Directed by David Zucker 

Written by Craig Mazin, Pat Proft 

Starring Anna Faris, Anthony Anderson, Kevin Hart, Leslie Nielsen, Simon Rex, Eddie Griffin 

Release Date October 24th, 2003 

Published October 23rd, 2003 

Scream was a film that changed the rules of modern horror forever by turning its conventions in on itself. Scary Movie had a timely “of the moment” quality even if the idea of parodying a film that was a parody in some respects itself was a little out there. Scary Movie succeeded, piling satire on top of pop culture scatology and earned its place amongst the best of modern madcap comedies. The sequel however could not match the energy of the original and most importantly its humor.

Now with a third sequel, Scary Movie has come to mirror the trilogy that inspired it. Scream 3 had none of the originality and creative energy of the first Scream and Scary Movie 3 is merely a pale imitation of its progenitor. The Zucker Brothers, the team behind the Airplane and Naked Gun films, take the creative reins from the Wayans Brothers. Even so, Scary Movie 3 is a limp parody of recent blockbusters ranging from The Matrix to The Others to M. Night Shyamalan's Signs and Eminem's 8 Mile. The modest 2002 horror hit The Ring provides the basis for much of the film’s satire.

Anna Faris returns as the series heroine Cindy Campbell, now working as a reporter ala Naomi Watts' character in The Ring. Cindy stumbles on two big news stories that may be connected, a videotape that promises death and crop circles in a small-town cornfield owned by Tom (Charlie Sheen in a parody of Mel Gibson's fallen priest in Signs). Simon Rex is George, Tom's younger brother and wannabe rapper a la Eminem in8 Mile. George is also Cindy's love interest in the film

None of the plot matters, of course, it's merely a jumping off point for movie parodies that reminded me of Weird Al Yankovic's song parodies. The film takes the plot of Signs or The Ring, recreates the scenes and simply changes the dialogue from melodrama to comedy. It's the same formula that worked so well in the original Scary Movie. However, the original smartly kept its focus on parodying one film at a time, Scary Movie 3 attempts to parody several different films all at once, at times more than one film in the same scene. The lack of focus forces the script to do a lot of explaining and re-explaining of what is being parodied. All of the exposition necessary to give context to the next gag is tiresome to say the least.

The film’s trailer is somewhat misleading. The trailer promises a Matrix parody with Queen Latifah and Eddie Griffin. In reality there is a bit of Matrix parody but Latifah and Griffin have more screen time in the trailer than in the actual film. I won't spoil the surprise of what actor plays the role of the Architect in another Matrix riff but it's one of the film’s few bright spots.

The film’s weak spots are numerous but especially glaring are its weak attempts at racial humor. The scenes that parody 8 Mile are completely off the mark and Simon Rex is especially overmatched attempting to send up Eminem who's verbal virtuosity is ten times funnier than any of the weak satire of Scary Movie 3. 

How do you send-up a character who himself is a brilliant parodist? You have to be able to top him and the Zucker Brothers never come close to any satire that Eminem hasn't already done himself and funnier. The Zucker's clearly lack the Wayans's sharp eye for racial humor. While watching the 8 Mile send-ups, you’re left to wonder how the Wayans Boys would have handled the same material and you know it would be far funnier.

The only thing Scary Movie 3 has going for it is Anna Faris who once again shows an astounding comedic ability to rise above even the most revolting indignities. Her Cindy Campbell has been beaten to heck in each of the three films and still Faris manages to shine. Faris takes on all of the lowest forms of humor with chipper aplomb and winks at the audience the whole way. She is the only element of Scary Movie 3 that works.

The Zucker Brothers with writing partner Jim Abrahams invented the parody genre. With Scary Movie 3 they may have effectively ended it from a creative standpoint. It's clear they have lost their deftness and comic touch in favor of half-assed, inane scatology. From a commercial standpoint unfortunately, the genre will likely have another life, it is clear this film will be a hit despite its innumerable flaws.

Movie Review Radio

Radio (2003)

Directed by Michael Tollin 

Written by Mike Rich 

Starring Cuba Gooding Jr, Ed Harris, Alfre Woodard, Debra Winger, Sarah Drew 

Release Date October 24th, 2003 

Published October 25th, 2003

Writer-Director-Producer Michael Tollin seems to aspire to mediocrity. A cursory look at his resume shows just that, a string of mediocre films as both a director and a producer. He has a particular affinity for the most mediocre of genres, the sports movie. With his partner, Brian Robbins, Tollin was a part of the predictable football movie Varsity Blues, the lame and predictable baseball movie Hardball and the God-awful Freddie Prinze Jr. movie Summer Catch. The latest addition to the Tollin-Robbins sports pantheon is Radio, a cloying tearjerker that hits all the manipulative notes.

The film stars Cuba Gooding Jr. as a mentally challenged man named Radio, a nickname given to him by Coach Harold Jones, the coach of the local High School football team. Coach decides to help out Radio after finding some of his players harassing the poor guy. Coach makes Radio a part of the team, allowing him to take part in practices and eventually allowing him into the school and classes.

Radio's involvement with the team and the school is good for him but is met with some resistance by a local booster Frank Clay (Chris Mulkey), who doesn't like Radio because, well, because he's just mean. That is really the only reason the movie gives for his unnecessarily rude behavior toward Radio who everyone else in town loves.

S. Epatha Merkerson turns up in the unforgiving role of Radio's mother whose fate is foretold from her first appearance onscreen. The rest of the supporting cast is less than memorable. Debra Winger is nearly unrecognizable in the role of the coach's wife, and young Sarah Drew in her first live action film role (she did voice work on TV's Daria) is not bad as the coach's oft-forgotten daughter.

Ed Harris is the only real asset of the film. His stature and dignity infuse his role with more credibility than it deserves. As written, the character is rather wishy-washy liberal do-gooder but with Harris in the role, the character has more weight and the melodramatic script is improved with his presence and delivery.

As for Gooding, just add Radio to the growing list of roles that have marked his career's death spiral since his Oscar winning role in Jerry Maguire. I've written way too much about Gooding's self destruction and it's getting harder and harder to watch. Jerry Maguire continues to be one of my all time favorites and Gooding was a huge part of that. However, the goodwill he earned from his role as Rod Tidwell is completely gone and his presence in any film is becoming unwelcome.

As for Tollin and his producing partner Brian Robbins, Radio shows little improvement over their previous mediocre outings. While it's billed as a true story and there is a real man named Radio who lives for high school football in South Carolina, the movie of his life never once rings true. Rather it is the same market-tested family drama that is better left to Hallmark Hall of fame.

Movie Review: Apocalypto

Apocalypto (2006) 

Directed by Mel Gibson

Written by Mel Gibson, Farhad Safinia 

Starring Rudy Youngblood

Release Date December 8th, 2006 

Published December 7th, 2006 

I truly believe that Mel Gibson needs psychological counseling. I'm not joking. It's not just his very public personal problems, but also his career choices and bizarre blood fetish. All the way back to his Oscar winning epic Braveheart, to his blood soaked take on the death of Jesus in The Passion of the Christ and now his latest blood soaked adventure Apocalypto takes Mel's his sanguine obsession to new horrifying depths.

Apocalypto is more violent and gruesome than all three Saw pictures combined. It makes Mel's own Passion look like a kiddie picture. Gibson has gone over the deep end with his obsession with viscera and yet his direction is so confident and professional I'm tempted to forgive his bloodlust. I can't; but I'm tempted.

In 500 B.C the Mayan culture came to a bloody and violent end. The fear, tumult and consumption grew to such epic proportions that it simply could no longer sustain itself. Mel Gibson's Apocalypto picks up the story near the end as the decadent violence began spilling beyond the mayans own borders. Human hunters began rampaging through small villages murdering innocent tribes and taking hostages who will become human sacrifices to the mayan gods.

Jaguar Paw (Rudy Youngblood) is a member of a small tribe on the far periphery of the Mayan empire. A peaceful hunting group, the tribe is living idyllically in peace when a mayan hunting group overruns them. Jaguar Paw manages to hide his pregnant wife and daughter in a crevasse before joining the fight and being taken hostage. Before he is taken however, he is forced to watch as his father is murdered.

Jaguar Paw and much of his tribe are marched back to the Mayan enclave where a giant stone staircase has been erected. The stairs are covered in blood and guts and as Jaguar Paw looks up at this massive structure; sacrifices are already taking place and seem to have started and never stop. As he is marched to the top heads roll down the stairs and bodies piled in gruesome, stomach turning piles next to the bloody alter.

Only a miracle saves Jaguar Paw from becoming a sacrifice but his escape is not assured. The hunting group decides to play a dangerous game, allowing Jaguar Paw to run away as they fire arrows and spears at his back. When he finds his way back to the forest the film becomes an epic chase scene filled with exciting escapes and horrifyingly brutal hand to hand combat.

On the one hand I was literally turning green from the stomach turning violence of Apocalypto. On the other hand, Gibson's filming of this violence, and especially the electrifying chase scenes, is so compelling I wanted to really like this film. His skill is so strong and his direction so assured that even the brutality is exceptionally well directed. Gibson's bloodlust is absolutely repellent, but his skill as a filmmaker is remarkable.

Rudy Youngblood is a terrific young actor who does an exceptional job in seperating himself from the rest of the cast and earning our sympathy. His performance goes along way to making Apocalypto an absorbing human drama. If it just wasn't so beyond acceptable levels of brutality I could recommend this film. As it is, Apocalypto is simply to vicious and blood soaked for me to recommend it to anyone, no matter how strong their stomach may be.

Alfred Hitchcock managed to make Birds a menacing force without having them ripping out someones eyeball. Martin Scorsese uses gory violence sparingly in his The Departed which gives the graphic nature of that violence much more punch. Mel Gibson could stand to learn a few things from Hitchcock and Scorsese. The extreme nature of the violence Gibson depicts in Apocalypto never fails to shock but the repetitive use of gory viscera does become numbing after a while and takes a great deal away from the compelling aspects of this story.

A touch of subtlety and Apocalypto could have been an extraordinary, epic, action adventure. As it is, the only thing anyone will take away from the experience of Apocalypto is just how sick a human being Mel Gibson must be. Gibson is obsessed with blood and guts and while he may justify his bloodlust by saying that he is trying to be 'realistic', there is no justification for presenting such brutality. There is a way to be true to the violence of Apocalypto without exploiting the gory aspects of it.

Mel Gibson is a terrifically talented director. He could be a great director, one who goes down in history. Unfortunately his obsession with blood and guts, and rolling heads down stairs, and ripping out peoples hearts, and stacks of headless human bodies makes him nothing more than a slasher filmmaker. He is just a cut above snuff films with his fixation on viscera and gore in Apocalypto as well as Passion of The Christ and Braveheart.

There is another oddball aspect of Apocalypto that needs to be mentioned. Early in the film, as Gibson is establishing the Idyll nature of Jaguar Paw's village, the tribe hunts and as they do they play pranks on one another and speak in a fashion that reminded me of the offhand nature of a Seinfeld episode. This is kind of entertaining but Gibson's translation of the mayan language used by his characters leaves one to wonder if he is being true to his characters or just going for cheap laughs.

Mel Gibson is impossible for me to like as a person, but as a director his talent is undeniable. His direction of Apocalypto is professional, polished and compelling. However, his bloodlust is so disturbing you must once again wonder about his character. How can a filmmaker, or any human being for that matter, meditate so deeply on such extreme violence.

I'm sure Mel Gibson felt the violence of Apocalypto was necessary to tell this story but the extreme nature of that violence is so graphic and so horrifying that it is fair to question his mental state. No matter how well depicted, I simply cannot recommend this level of violence to anyone no matter their tolerance for extreme amounts of blood and guts.

Mel Gibson, please seek help.