Oct 26
RECOMMENDED
Puerto Rico, 1960. Everyone is insane, everyone is a maniac. Period. The Eisenhower era tumbles tightly to an end up north across the water. Here, it’s humid and there’s rum. There is ludic cynicism—”The average guy don’t rock the boat because they want to get on it”—and there is brittle contempt—”A liberal is a commie with a college education thinking Negro thoughts.” There is also Gonzo avant la lettre in this period piece: “You’re giving me fear!”/”You’re high, you fool!” Read the rest of this entry »
Oct 12
Crazy Horse
By Ray Pride
No matter even if you truly wanted to, there’s no way a single viewer could give you an overview of an international film festival with more than a hundred events: you can surmise all you want, based on what festival films have played or have been reviewed at already, or the filmmakers’ reputation. Even festival programmers miss out on sections they’re not part of. I’ll be curious to see statistics after this year’s CIFF to see how many programs the average, but dedicated moviegoer, is able to attend. It’s tough even if you’ve been to a few prior festivals, seen a fistful of advance screeners, availed yourself of advance screenings. But, as luck, fortune or programming may have it, Chicago International has more programs of note in its second week, and a growing number of them have further distribution in the near future. (Disclosure: I was a program consultant for this year’s Docufest section.) Read the rest of this entry »
Oct 12
RECOMMENDED
Anne Sewitsky’s “Happy, Happy” is a genial jab of a comedy about small frustrations and small satisfactions. A privileged couple in the Norwegian countryside rent a house out to new tenants, who have an adopted African son. The dynamics of the two couples quickly clash, especially in a discomfiting early dinner scene. Sexual dismay leads to emotional display, especially from the delightful Agnes Kittelsen whose needs the other characters respond to, whose character Sewitsky calls “insistently happy… her driving force becomes happiness.” Read the rest of this entry »
Oct 12
RECOMMENDED
Documentary as mockery and cruelty and voyeurism and exploitation, “Shut Up Little Man!: An Audio Misadventure” is also often pants-pissingly funny, the kind of movie that used to open underground film festivals, but barked its way into Sundance 2011. In 1987, two very young men move into a “ramshackle shithole of a place” in San Francisco; their neighbors, a flamboyant gay man and an ostentatious homophobe do verbal battle by night and day. Read the rest of this entry »
Oct 05
RECOMMENDED
Horror-comedy’s hard, but Eli Craig’s daffy, near-delirious “Tucker & Dale Vs. Evil,” which debuted at Sundance and SXSW in 2010, makes the spurting, spirited redneck slasher movie look easy. The good guys live in the hills; it’s those terrible college students, an unaware “car full of morons” out on a lark who are going to step into all the wrong things. These guys aren’t bad: Call these surprisingly smart locals “Straw Puppies.” Read the rest of this entry »
Oct 04
When in Rom… In Anna Faris’ first film as star and co-producer, “What’s Your Number,” she’s intermittently adorable but she’s in a patchy, baggy misfire. (Hearing Faris say the too-twee “adorbs” with her deadpan kitten affect would be almost as fine as the many-yet-too-few “What. The. Fuck.”‘s with which she drops anchor.) One of the articles of faith to demonstrate that the cinema is a godless art is the profligate waste of a fount of inspiration like Faris. While she’s dead center in most every one of the script’s sketches, she can’t breathe air into its deadly contrivances. There are bridesmaids, but it’s no “Bridesmaids.” The production goes beyond trying to make her a latter-day Goldie Hawn, a ditz of steel—the camera’s idolatrous, even. Read the rest of this entry »
Sep 28
By Ray Pride
Twenty-seven-year-old Adam (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), a producer for Seattle public radio, faces a diagnosis of a rare, usually fatal form of cancer with the help of longtime friend Kyle (Seth Rogen), his imperious mother (Anjelica Huston) and Katherine, a trainee therapist (Anna Kendrick).
Stuff of tragedy? Stuff of comedy? It’s the stuff of the superb third feature by Jonathan Levine (“The Wackness”), bearing probably as marketable a title as could be found for a based-on-life screenplay that began life as “I’m With Cancer.” Read the rest of this entry »
Adam Sandler has played a comedian, not to mention an architect, chef, firefighter, Hollywood agent, plastic surgeon and a veterinarian. In his new comedy “Jack and Jill” he is not much of a comedian on-camera or off. Credited as a producer and co-writer, Sandler plays the head of a Los Angeles advertising agency. His already limited comedic skills take a downturn, even as he doubles his screen time by playing the twins Jack Sadelstein and Jill Sadelstein. Read the rest of this entry »
