Easy Virtue, the new film from The Adventures of Priscilla Queen of the Desert director Stephan Elliott, is a comedy-of-manners loosely based on a Noël Coward play of the same name. Originally filmed as a silent movie in 1928 by Alfred Hitchcock, the new version is anything but quiet with the British members of the cast—Colin Firth, Kristin Scott Thomas and Narnia’s Ben Barnes—expertly lobbing frothy dialogue too and fro. It’s up to the lone above-the-title American star Jessica Biel, not to get lost in the crossfire.
Biel is Larita, a brash American widow who marries John Whittaker (Barnes), a wealthy Brit after a brief romance in the south of France. When John brings home his new wife, or the “gold-digger from the land of opportunists” as she is seen by his mother (Kristen Scott Thomas), a class war erupts between the spirited Larita and stiff upper lipped Whittakers.
Easy Virtue is the latest big release from Ealing Studios. For over 100 years the British studio has been synonymous with quality comedy, particularly during their 1940s and 50s heyday when they produced classics like Passport to Pimlico, Kind Hearts and Coronets and The Ladykillers. Like its predecessors Easy Virtue has its virtues—it’s a quality production, elegantly directed and, for the most part, nicely acted, but a classic it’s not. I doubt it’ll ever sit on the shelf next to any of the studio’s better known titles.
It’s a hard movie to hate, but an even harder one to love. While it has its moments—the 1970s disco hit Car Wash is nicely adapted and snuck into the soundtrack as a jaunty British ragtime tune, butler Furber is played with deadpan perfection by Kris Marshall and much attention has been paid to the period sets and costumes—it’s a little too frivolous too make much of an impression.
It is worth a look to see Kristin Scott Thomas take standard mother-in-law joke of a role and bring it to vibrant, acidic life or Colin Firth bang off one-liners with the ease of drawing room comedy veteran but while I know many people who wouldn’t mind watching Jessica Biel for 90 minutes she isn’t one of the movie’s stronger elements.
In recent years Biel has worked very hard to break out of the model turned actress mold and take on increasingly challenging roles, and while Easy Virtue is a step forward toward her goal, she’s still a few feet away from the finish line. Witty lines that fall trippingly off the tongues of the Brits in the cast sound flat and clunky in Biel’s delivery and a scene with a dog, a pillow and an unfortunate accident proves that light comedy is not her forte.
Easy Virtue isn’t a terrible film, it’s just not very memorable.
All babies are adorable. Whether they walk on two legs or four, have fur all over, or wings, tusks or even a blow hole, there is something irresistible about the young of any species. The makers of the new Disney film Earth know this and the cute factor of this natural history documentary is dialed way up. Of course there is a strong environmental message mixed into the story of the migration paths of four animal families but my guess is kids will walk away with visions of baby polar bears dancing in their heads rather than concern about global warming.
Earth is a condensed version of the BBC series Planet Earth, a ninety minute trek from pole to pole. Shot over 4,500 days in 200 locations around the globe the combined budget of the television show and the movie is upwards of $40 million, making it the most expensive documentary ever, and every dime of it is on the screen. It’s a visually spectacular feast for the eyes. Beautiful time lapse photography and stunning aerial shots of Mount Everest are pure eye candy, but it is the intimate and thrilling shots of the animals that are truly memorable. From baby polar bears shakily taking their first steps to the preening, exotic Bird of Paradise and the spectacular humpback whale and calf hunting for plankton, the film gets us up close and personal with these creatures.
These images speak for themselves and as such don’t need the clumsy and overly simplistic narration. Voiced with booming gravitas by James Earl Jones (there are different narrators for different countries, including Patrick Stewart) the voice over is repetitive and lacks any new information or insight. Maybe bring an iPod and just enjoy the pictures.
Earth is a Disney release, so it is family friendly, but there are a couple of scenes involving the cruel realities of the animal kingdom that may be too intense for very young viewers. One little girl—maybe just three or four years old—at the screening I saw yelled, “Why! Daddy! Why!” during a scene where a wolf tracks and captures a caribou calf. It’s bloodless, the camera cuts away before nature really takes its toll, but is scary nonetheless.
Earth is a beautifully made film that errs on the side of cutesy a bit too often, but is a splendid experience nonetheless.
The Express is more than just another “inspirational sports movie.” Based on real events it is the moving story of college football hero Ernie Davis (Rob Brown), two-time All-American halfback at Syracuse and the first African-American to win the Heisman Trophy. His courage in the fight for equality and in the face of terminal illness—he was the most celebrated college player of his time but died before his first pro game—has made him a legend on and off the football pitch.
The film’s set-up is standard for these kinds of sports movies. In this case a young gifted football player overcomes poverty to earn a scholarship to a top flight university. After a slow start he leads the team to greatness. We’ve seen it before, but the thing that differentiates The Express from movies like Pride, Glory Road and We Are the Titans is the way the film takes the story beyond where most of these others end. Most often the credits roll after the big game. Against all odds our heroes have won or nearly won the playoffs and the movie ends with a blast of adrenalin designed to make you shake your fist in the air and walk out of the theatre invigorated.
The Express takes a smarter approach. There is the prerequisite exciting big game but the story really deepens after the final touchdown when Davis points out that sports is not just about the playing of the game, it’s about something more important—what you play for. The best sports movies are never really about sports.
By refusing to play by the unspoken racist rules of the day, by being the best college player of his day, by being a role model the real-life Ernie Davis became a symbol for the growing civil rights movement and a hero to African-Americans in the way that Jackie Robinson had inspired people in the 1940s. His talent transcended race and as the movie makes clear in its final moments, he became a symbol of achievement for people of all races.
In the lead role Finding Forrester’s Rob Brown hands in a nice, natural performance that gains momentum as the story deepens in the last reel. Playing against him as Coach Ben Schwartzwalder, Dennis Quaid takes a role that could easily have been simply a walking mound of clichés and breathes real life into the character.
The Express proves that inspirational sports movies don’t have to stick to a tried and true formula to actually be inspirational.
In the last couple of years Shia LeBeouf has matured from zany teen star of the Disney Channel’s Even Stevens to the unlikely action hero of movies like Transformers, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and Disturbia. The latest film hoping to parlay his on-screen likeability into big box office returns is Eagle Eye, a thriller that asks how far would you go to protect the ones you love when your life has suddenly turned into one long terrorist red alert.
As the action begins LeBeouf is slacker Jerry Shaw, a copy center clerk whose overachieving twin brother has just been killed in a car accident. In another part of town single mother Rachel Holloman (Michelle Monaghan) is preparing her 8-year-old son for a trip to Washington, DC. Their lives are brought together when they both receive mysterious phone calls, coercing them into a series of dangerous situations. As their circumstances spins out of control and with the FBI on their heels, the two bond to try and discover who is behind the threatening phone calls.
The word “implausible” could have been invented to describe the plot of Eagle Eye. Director D.J. Caruso has crafted the most elaborate terrorist plot ever! This one makes all the James Bond villains, in all the 007 books and movies with their combined evil genius IQs look like beginners. The idea that the mysterious voice on the phone is all seeing and can control the entire world’s technology from traffic lights to cell phones to pixel boards in airports is mind-bogglingly fanciful but is executed with so much style that the unbelievable aspects of the story get swept away by the film’s breathless pacing.
The manipulation of technology that leads LeBeouf and Monaghan further and further down the rabbit hole, while improbable, perfectly plays into people’s fear of technology. What would happen if someone or something could actually turn all the computers, cell phones and techno gadgets that have become part of our everyday lives against us? The movie offers up one possibility, but is essentially just a cartoon, a wild ride that values action and explosions over the any high-falutin’ ideas about privacy issues or the helplessness that ordinary people feel in the face of terrorism. It is simply a taut thriller that aims to keep you on the edge of your seat.
LeBeouf and Monaghan have good chemistry as the everyman and woman leads and Billy Bob Thornton hands in a smooth and occasionally funny performance as FBI Agent Thomas Morgan, but frankly, the actors here are simply a plot device for Eagle Eye’s wild action scenes.
The Academy Award winner unwittingly opened the floodgates when he repopularized the first person documentary. Moore films such as Roger and Me, Bowling for Columbine and Fahrenheit 911 inspired clones both good—Super Size Me, anything by Nick Broomfield—bad—My Date with Drew—and now ugly. In Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed former game show host Ben Stein turned roving reporter asking the question, “If we allow free speech to disappear in science, where will it end?”
Using a Moore-esque blend of animation, archival footage and interviews he sets out to prove his idea that the scientific community’s unwillingness to accept the role of religion in the creation story is a free speech issue. In his search for the truth, or at least his version of the truth, Stein speaks to many science professionals on both sides of the debate revolving around intelligent design and Darwinism.
He interviews several university professors and researchers who claim to have lost high profile jobs for the “science sin” of mentioning, not even teaching, creationism. Fired by their Darwinist masters many of them now say they are outcasts in the scientific community, unable to find meaningful work because of their beliefs.
The flipside of these poor beleaguered intelligent design proponents are the Darwinists whose inflammatory declarations are deliberately edited and geared to present them as precocious eggheads whose moral compass has gone askew.
“Intelligent design is so boring I can’t even be bothered to think about it anymore,” says one scientist. “Religion is a primitive superstition,” says another. One more compares a belief in God to a comforting pastime, not unlike knitting. These people, if you haven’t figured it out yet, are the film’s villains.
This is a truly strange movie. Modeled on Moore’s left wing documentaries, Expelled takes a sharp turn to the right suggesting that anyone or any institution that that ignores intelligent design is somehow unpatriotic. Wrapping his thesis in good old American jingoistic rhetoric—remember this guy used to write speeches for Nixon—Stein repeatedly compares Darwinist scientists to communists by the suggestion that the only way they can get funding for research is to be good Darwinist “comrades” and even makes the outrageous connection between Darwin’s theory and Nazism. To bolster this argument he heavy handedly layers the film with footage of the Berlin Wall—it’s supposed to represent the rift in the scientific community with ID on one side and the evil communist Darwinians on the other—and images of Stalin.
As for alternative theories regarding the beginning of life as we know it Stein presents two fringe Darwinian propositions. Perhaps, suggests one scientist, life cold have appeared on the backs of crystals, while another mentions Earth having been seeded by aliens. Stein meets both with the kind of skepticism usually reserved for something you’d read in the Weekly World News next to a story about Bat Boy.
Despite its conservative slant Expelled does ask some interesting questions—Does science erode religious belief? Does Darwinism devalue human life? Is the scientific mainstream afraid of other ideas?—and could have worked as a pop propaganda pastiche if it wasn’t so ham-fisted.
Never one to use a feather when a hammer will do, Stein employs a number of hoary old Fleet Street tabloid tricks to try and create drama. For example when he and his crew are kicked out of the Smithsonian for filming without a permit it’s presented as though the Smithsonian is somehow curtailing Stein’s quest for the truth. What he’s doing there in the first place is never made clear and perhaps if a line producer had called first and arranged to show up with a camera they wouldn’t have had to deal with security. In other cases deliberately provocative footage is added to the narrative to subliminally influence the viewer.
Perhaps it isn’t just a co-incidence that the host’s initials are B.S.
Stein is an unlikely emcee. Stone-faced and monotone he doesn’t exactly drip star appeal, but he has some audience goodwill, I guess, from his days as a television host and his beloved movie role in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, but here he comes across as manipulative and grating. Trained as a lawyer he’s smart enough to only ask questions he knows the answer to, so many of the exchanges in the film seem less like interviews and more like Stein baiting his subjects to provide answers he can use and manipulate to further his theories.
It’s all a bit much really and so over the top it’s hard to take seriously. It’s a hot button topic for sure, but in its own hyperbolic way Expelled would have us believe that teaching Darwinian evolution while ignoring intelligent design is a greater threat to freedom than Osama Bin Laden or any of his Al Qaeda cohorts. I wonder what Michael Moore thinks of the demon he’s unleashed on us all.
And so Oscar® season begins in earnest. Cate Blanchett is returning to the role that made her a star and earned her first Academy Award nomination—Elizabeth I, the Virgin Queen. Elizabeth: the Golden Age is the kind of movie you don’t see in theatres until Oscar® ballots are about to be printed; a big budget period piece with big stars and laced with treachery and romance. It’s kind of like Pirates of the Caribbean but with a brain but nowhere near the blockbuster potential. It will, however, grab more Oscars® attention than Johnny and company.
Dust off the history books, we’re going back to 1585’s Europe. When the story rejoins Elizabeth she is facing attack from Spanish King Philip II (Jordi Molla) who is hell-bent to bring Catholicism back to England. Elizabeth must protect her country, but there is a distracting chink in her armor—a crush on the hunky poet-warrior Sir Walter Raleigh (Clive Owen). Her sacred vow to her country precludes giving herself to anyone but royalty, so, in an effort to keep Raleigh close she plays matchmaker, setting him up with her nearest and dearest lady-in-waiting Bess (Abbie Cornish).
At her side throughout all this is trusted advisor Sir Francis Walsingham (Geoffrey Rush reprising his role from the first La Liz movie). As pressures mount abroad Walsingham helms the battle plans but must also keep on eye on unrest at home. Using a spy system that would make the CIA green with envy he unearths an assassination plot but unwittingly sets England up for devastation.
First the good stuff. Of late Blanchett seems to have the popular vote as “greatest living film actress,” supplanting Meryl Streep, and Elizabeth: The Golden Age won’t tarnish that platitude one bit. She delivers a strong willed performance that centers the movie, adding both humanity and vulnerability to a character often seen as stiff and steely. Her pale skin—she’s the most pallid performer this side of Casper the Friendly Ghost—is almost translucent, all the better to see the inner workings of Elizabeth, a complicated woman who ran a country but had trouble running her life. The Academy likes giving awards to actors playing real people, and just last year Helen Mirren took home a statue for playing a Queen, so look for Blanchett at Oscar® time.
Other performances impress—Rush is suitable stately, although underused, Owen exudes his usual sex appeal and seems to be channeling Errol Flynn while Abbie Cornish (soon to appear in Stop Loss opposite Ryan Phillippe) as Elizabeth’s BFF Bess provides a welcome addition of girl power to the proceedings. Costume and set design are both exemplary, and whoever created Blanchett’s elaborate wigs deserves a prize simply for their work with a curling iron.
Now, the bad. The 1998 Elizabeth I was tightly plotted and smart, two things the new film are not. Unfortunately The Golden Age throws most of the history out the window and allows plotlines seemingly borrowed from The Bold and the Beautiful to sneak in. Director Shekhar Kapur may have been trying make an accessible film about an historical figure, but oft times the lovey-dovey stuff feels like we’re watching an episode of The Hills: The Medieval Years.
Elizabeth: The Golden Age is a deeply flawed movie with good performances, marred by bad CGI—the shots of the invading Armada look like a bad paint-by-numbers renderings—a bombastic musical score and a juvenile story that feels like it should star characters named Biffy and Susie, not Sir Walter and Queen Elizabeth.
The filmmakers behind Evan Almighty, or as I like to call it The Movie We’re Going to be Watching on Television After Easter Dinner for the Next Twenty Years or So are clearly hoping to have families lining up two by two to see this movie, reported to be the most expensive comedy ever made.
In this sort-of sequel to Bruce Almighty, Steve Carell stars as Evan Baxter, a former newscaster turned US Congressman. The night before his first session in Congress he prays for the strength to do his part to change the world and to be able to spend more time with his family. As you may have heard, God (Morgan Freeman) works in mysterious ways, and grants Baxter’s wish by commanding him to build an ark. How that is going to do anything but turn him into a laughing stock isn’t immediately made clear. What is clear (to his family and co-workers at least) is that Baxter appears to have lost his mind. When wild animals start turning up, in pairs, at his home and office it seems he isn’t some crackpot, but a man on a mission from God.
When his hair starts to grow uncontrollably and his wardrobe choices change from three piece power suits to two piece flowing robes he gets suspended from his job, allowing him to spend more time with his family who help him build his ark. See where this is going?
Anyone laying down their hard-earned cash expecting to see the Steve Carell of The Office or The 40 Year Old Virgin will be disappointed. Here, apart from a few gags at the beginning, and some funny monkey business (literally) he is mostly acting as straight man here. The irreverent comedy he is best known for is absent, and Evan Almighty feels like it has been sanitized for family audiences to the point of becoming bland.
There are a few laughs, but whoever said that you should never act with kids or animals was on to something. Carell just seems lost amid the livestock.
There are some effective special effects, where I guess the bulk of the $200 million budget went, but none have the wow factor necessary to rescue this movie from ho-hum-ville.
Evan Almighty is a simple retelling of the Moses and the Ark story; is a moral tale with strong messages for families, but, (Evan help us!), misses out on one crucial element that would have improved this so-called comedy—jokes.
Eight Below is the story of a boy and his dog. Actually, make that an extremely good-looking boy and his dogs. Based on a Japanese movie that was, in turn, based on a true story, Eight Below probably has little to do with what actually happened to eight Arctic sled dogs left behind by their trainer when bad weather prevented him from air lifting them to safety, but it does have the elements of a good family film.
Paul Walker plays the good-looking trainer and Arctic tracker who feels he betrayed his dogs when, through no fault of his own, he was forced to leave them to die. These dogs are not simply his best friends, but also, the movie would have us believe, his soul mates. He tries to make his way back to the Arctic to save them, but to no avail. The worst winter storm in 25 years has made the trip impossible. Meanwhile the dogs are left to their own defenses, and the movie follows their progress as well as our hero’s.
As with most Disney dog movies you actually care more about the dogs than the bland actors surrounding them. Paul Walker has the looks of a leading man, but the charisma of a mannequin come to life. Jason Biggs, late of the American Pie movies, is clearly here for comedic relief but seems out of place, as though he is still trying to lose his virginity by prom night.
Luckily we have the housebroken actors. Their story of survival—March of the Huskies?—is the most compelling story in the movie, but be warned there are a couple of Old Yeller moments that might wring a few tears from younger viewers. The filmmakers made a very wise choice not to use any CGI for the dog’s faces, and as a result these dogs look natural and inspire emotion.
Eight Below is a good, solid family film although some scenes may be a little intense for tots.
I don’t think that I have ever done a flip-flip on a movie as cataclysmic as the shift in my opinion on Elizabethtown. As much as I respect and admire Cameron Crowe I just didn’t get Elizabethtown when I saw it at the Toronto International Film Festival this year. That cut of the movie was too long, too self-indulgent and frankly, boring. I changed my mind, however, when I saw the Slim Fast version of the movie that has been cut by about half-an-hour.
Crowe has trimmed the fat off the story about a young man—played by Orlando Bloom—who has just designed a shoe that was supposed to revolutionize the industry, but instead is a disaster, losing close to a billion dollars. At the same time he must deal with the death of his father, his extended family in Elizabethtown Kentucky and a perky flight attendant he meets on the way to his father’s memorial service. This time less really is more. The ruthless editing saved the movie, turning it into an enjoyable darkly comic romance.
Crowe has always had a deft hand at directing women—think Rene Zellweger in Jerry Maguire, Cameron Diaz in Vanilla Sky or Kate Hudson in Almost Famous and in Elizabethtown he shines the light on Kirsten Dunst. She is frequently good in films, but she really steals this movie as the cute and kooky stewardess who helps keep Bloom’s head screwed on during his bereavement. She has several unforgettable moments—when she tells Bloom to stop trying to break up with her; her giggly reaction when Bloom asks her a personal question on the telephone. Without her performance the trip to Elizabethtown wouldn’t be nearly as much fun.
