Movie Review Mad Money

Mad Money (2008) 

Directed by Callie Khourie 

Written by Glenn Gers 

Starring Diane Keaton, Queen Latifah, Katie Holmes, Ted Danson, Stephen Root

Release Date January 18th, 2008 

Published January 18th, 2008 

For all her grace, style and class Diane Keaton certainly has poor taste in comedy. Her last picture was the vociferously awful Because I Said So a comedy so witless as to disprove the theory that young Mandy Moore had a bright future in this business. Prior to that Ms. Keaton demeaned herself as the dying cancer ridden matriarch of The Family Stone, a film that proved no matter how many well known actors and actresses you cram into one scene you can't make a bad script good. Now Ms. Keaton demeans herself further with what arguably should have been her first direct to DVD feature Mad Money. This alleged comedy about a down on her luck upper class housewife forced to take a job as a Janitor at the federal reserve where she plots a heist with two stereotypical co-workers is yet another low in the ever devolving career of the woman who once played muse to Woody Allen's finest work.

Mad Money stars Diane Keaton as Bridget, the wife of a wealthy investment banker (Ted Danson, also slumming) who suddenly finds himself out of a job. With their upper class lifestyle on the wane and buzzard neighbors circling their home at the stench of financial death, Bridget forces herself to take a job. Having never worked a day in her life the only work she is qualified for is janitorial. She finds a gig cleaning toilets and taking out the trash at the federal reserve, the place that prints the country's cash. Did you know they destroy the old cash there as well?

Bridget did not know that but once she finds out she hatches a complex plot to steal the cash that would otherwise have been destroyed. She can't do it on her own however, and what luck, the woman in charge of the cash destroying machine (Queen Latifah) happens to be a struggling single mom desperate to get her children out of the 'hood'. She alone is not accomplice enough. They need one more insider and find the help they need in a hippie chick (Katie Holmes) who transports the to be destroyed dollars from one part of the building to the other.

The 'complex' plan involves locks and trash cans... and that's about it. Not much to think about. Director Callie Khouri likely did not want to confuse the film's core constituency of low watt bulbs. The fan base for a film like Mad Money had best not be too bright otherwise they would be watching a better movie. The trailers and commercials have told you already exactly what I have told you, without the witty, cynical banter, obviously. Do our conspirators get caught? What do the respective placeholders who portray their love interests think of this stealing operation?

None of that seems to matter to Khouri or her cast who are more interested in looking cute and reveling in their girl power faux feminism than in actually crafting something that might involve an audience. Mad Money is yet another dismal effort from Diane Keaton whose lack of discernment is becoming a career hallmark dating back to the dreadful First Wives Club and only getting worse from there.

Movie Review Pieces of April

Pieces of April (2003) 

Directed Peter Hedges 

Written by Peter Hedges 

Starring Katie Holmes, Patricia Clarkson, Derek Luke, Isaiah Whitlock, Allison Pill 

Release Date October 17th, 2003 

Published October 24th, 2003 

It's been a terrific year for first time directors. Artists such as Catherine Hardwicke (Thirteen), Fernando Meirelles (City of God) and Peter Sollett (Raising Victor Vargas) made their debuts in exciting and memorable fashion. The same can be said of Peter Hedges whose debut feature Pieces of April is a guerrilla-style DV feature made with the catering budget from one days shooting on The Matrix. A visually unspectacular character piece that works because of a smart script and the acid tongue acting of Patricia Clarkson.

The title character is April Burns (Katie Holmes), the black sheep of her upstate New York family who ran away at an early age to New York City and has never looked back. After years of aimless drifting and a tenuous relationship with her family, April is finally in a stable enough situation to reconnect. With the help of her new boyfriend Bobby (Derek Luke), April has invited the family to her tiny apartment for Thanksgiving.

April's family isn't all that excited about the holiday excursion to the big city. Joy Burns (Clarkson) has little interest in reconciling with her oldest daughter of whom she claims to have no positive memories. Youngest daughter Beth (Allison Pill) can't stop complaining about the trip, her and April are far apart in years and have had no contact since April left. Timmy (John Gallagher Jr.), April's little brother, has little interest in anything outside the purview of his camera and the haze of pot smoke. April's dad Jim (Oliver Platt) is the only one in the family who has maintained any contact with April. Agreeing to go to April's for Thanksgiving seems to be entirely his effort and he holds the trip together over the loud protest of his kids and the biting wit of Joy.

There is far more to this story than a daughter trying to reconnect with her family. The impetus for the attempted reconciliation is revealed in an episodic way with a little bit of information leaked out as the focus shifts back and forth from the family road trip to April's failing attempts at cooking, including some especially humorous encounters with her neighbors. With a busted oven, April is forced to run from door to door, soliciting help from anyone who will listen. 

Finally April is aided by an African-American couple, Evette (Lillias White) and Eugene (Isiah Whitlock Jr.), who take their cooking far more seriously than April. Also helping, in a way, is Wayne (Sean Hayes) who allows April to use his oven when Evette and Eugene need to use their own for their dinner. Wayne turns out to be way too weird and flaky and April is finally helped by an elderly Asian family who don't speak English but luckily have a visiting family member who does. April's aborted attempts to explain Thanksgiving to them are funny and a few of Holmes's best scenes.

Patricia Clarkson's much praised performance is unquestionably the film’s centerpiece. Her ascorbic wit and spitefulness is explained by the fact that Joy is dying of breast cancer and that this will very likely be her last Thanksgiving. The last thing she wants to do is spend it with the daughter who has been such a painful disappointment, especially since the dinner will more than likely be another disaster to add to the list. Clarkson's performance is painful to watch as she says horrible things about April who does not deserve most of the jibes. We are forced to forgive Joy her mean spirit because she is dying and we do but it makes her jabs at April and her attitude towards all of her family all the more disheartening.

Director Peter Hedges, who received a much deserved Oscar nomination for his adapted screenplay for About A Boy, writes a story sketch for Pieces of April and then turns loose his terrific group of actors to make something of it. With a seemingly bare bones sketch of dialogue, the actors make some obvious improvisations that make the film feel real.

That effect is also brought out by the handheld DV camera and minimalist locations. The minimal lighting, ambient soundtrack, and miniscule budget are straight out of the Dogme 95 movement. While it's not nearly as accomplished as anything by Lars Von Trier and his Dogme crew, Pieces of April invokes a sort of Americanized version of Dogme. It incorporates the realities of American filmmaking that simply won't allow a filmmaker to follow the rigid Dogme rules.

Pieces of April is in spirit a Dogme film and the attempt to subvert the usual Hollywood style of filmmaking is a welcome sight. The film is also an affecting, funny family drama with terrific acting and writing that marks a terrific directorial debut for Peter Hedges. I hope that he will continue to be as interesting with a film that has a budget bigger than the cost of Peter Jackson's morning latte.

Movie Review Phone Booth

Phone Booth (2003) 

Directed by Joel Schumacher 

Written by Larry Cohen 

Starring Colin Farrell, Kiefer Sutherland, Katie Holmes, Forrest Whitaker, Radha Mitchell 

Release Date April 4th, 2003 

Published April 3rd, 2003 

Like many fans of the D.C Comics Superhero Batman I have harbored a good deal of resentment toward Director Joel Schumacher for screwing up the Batman movies. However, whether I've become more mature or Schumacher's films have gotten better, that resentment has lessened. As Bat nipples and bat credit cards recede into the past, I find myself not liking Schumacher's take on the blockbuster franchise, but also not caring nearly as much as I once did about Schumacher having made a bad Batman movie. 

Since his Batman debacle Schumacher has done good work. Schumacher's work on Tigerland, for instance, was astonishingly low-tech yet very artful as the director coaxed a star turn out of then unknown actor Colin Farrell. Now with Schumacher's return to the big budget Hollywood machine, he brings Farrell with him in the minimalist action pic Phone Booth. I find myself once again appreciating the artistry of the man who killed Batman.

In Phone Booth, Colin Farrell is shady public relations guy Stu Shepard. Though Stu is married to Kelly, played by Radha Mitchell, he is also romancing a young starlet named Pam, played by Katie Holmes. When Stu decides to use a payphone booth to call Pam rather than one of his three cell phones, he finds himself the target of a crazed assassin (Kiefer Sutherland's voice). If Stu leaves the booth, he will be shot.

Stu's situation is complicated by a group of prostitutes who want the phone booth and are becoming increasingly more agitated. When the prostitutes get a male friend to try and remove Stu from the booth the assassin shoots the guy and Stu is blamed. As cops arrive, led by Forest Whitaker as the police negotiator, so do the media as well as Stu's wife and girlfriend.

This is quite a daring setup and the execution is flawless. When writer Larry Cohen pitched this story he had to have been met with a number of blank stares. So it comes as no surprise that he's been pitching the story for nearly 20 years. It wasn't until Joel Schumacher signed on that studios began to get interested in this challenging premise. Schumacher's involvement brought some interest from big name stars such as Jim Carrey and Will Smith but it's Farrell (admittedly the cheaper alternative to Carrey and Smith's $20 Million dollar price tags), who took the role and proved to be the perfect choice.

Farrell brings just the right combination of smarm and charm to the role of Stu. Farrel recalls a young Al Pacino, with his sweaty, passionate and energetic performance. Farrell melts down like a pro. As Stu slowly melts from cocky confident defiance to contrite good guy, Farrell never panders to the audience, never begs to be liked. Farrell remains true to the character’s nature, attempting to lie and negotiate his way out all the way to the end, always looking for an angle. 

The real star of Phone Booth however is Joel Schumacher, who's sweeping camera ratchets up the tension from beginning to end. Schumacher does a first rate Hitchcock impression taking this difficult premise and wringing every last bit of tension from it. Using the same real time approach that Hitchcock employed in Rope, Schumacher uses dialogue and stellar camerawork to keep the audience constantly off balance and on the edge of their seat.

Recently Joel Schumacher admitted that he screwed up Batman. That admission and a few more excellent films like Tigerland and Phone Booth and maybe I can forgive him. Of course, there is still 8MM to apologize for but let's leave that for another day. -

The Cave (2005) – A Soggy, Sinking Creature Feature

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