Richard’s reviews Michael Fassbender as iCon Steve Jobs in the movie of the same name, Ellen Page and Julianne Moore as LGBT trailblazers in “Freeheld,” Deepa Mehta’s “Beeba Boys” and the Alison Brie rom com “Sleeping with Other People.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
“Freeheld,” a new true-to-life drama starring Julianne Moore and Ellen Page, is that rare kind of movie that manages to be depressing and uplifting simultaneously.
It’s love at first serve when Stacie Andree (Page) and Laurel Hester (Moore) meet at a volleyball game. Laurel is a decorated New Jersey cop who has stayed closeted, even from her partner Dane Wells (Michael Shannon) because, as she says, “In law-enforcement women don’t get important cases; gay women, never.” Stacie is a mechanic in Pennsylvania whose big dream is for a simple life with a house, a dog and a loving wife.
Stacie’s dream comes true when the couple buy a house, get a dog and settle down. Their quiet life is turned upside down when Laurel is diagnosed with terminal cancer.
“If anything happens I want my pension to go to Stacy,” Laurel says to Dane. “That’s the only way she can keep the house.”
“But that’s only for married people isn’t it?”
With Laurel’s cancer spreading and the town council’s refusal to recognize Laurel and Stacie’s domestic partnership as legal, a small group of supporters—including Wells and lawyer Steven Goldstein (Steve Carell)—fight for the couple’s right to secure Hester’s pension benefits.
“Freeheld” is set in 1999 but the story feels ripped from the headlines. It’s a story of cancer and a detective tale but mostly it’s a story about the fight for equality in the LGBT community. It can be a frustrating watch as the town council, the Freeholders (Kevin O’Rourke, Tom McGowan, Dennis Boutsikaris, Josh Charles), argue against bestowing Laurel’s pension for political and moral reasons, despite having a clear right to do so under the law. The usual old boy excuses prevail—So anyone can marry anyone and assign their benefits? It violates the sanctity of marriage!—until (SPOILER ALERT EVEN THOUGH IT’S ON THE HISTORIAL RECORD!) mounting pressure forces their hand.
Moore has the showier role but it is Page who keeps the story earthbound. The issue of gay rights is so huge, so monumental it is sometimes easy to forget that it’s not simply a movement, but a cause that affects real people. The looks that register on Page’s face during Laurel’s illness and the ensuing pension battle make it personal in the most effective and beautiful way. Her face takes the story beyond Goldstein’s rhetoric and political theatre—“It’s Stephen with a V for Very gay,” he says, “and when people disrespect my brothers and sisters I reign down terror on them.”—stripping it of everything except for love and concern.
“Freeheld” is a crowd pleaser—unless, of course, you’re a Kentucky county clerk—that dramatizes and humanizes a landmark case in the ongoing battle for gay rights.
1. Admission: Tina Fey is Portia Nathan, a mildly compulsive Princeton admissions officer—they jokingly call her their “golden retriever” because of her record of recruiting a-plus students—who leads a quiet, ordered life with professor Mark (Michael Sheen). They share a love of poetry, hatred of kids and not much else. Her well ordered life is thrown into disarray when John Pressman (Rudd), a free-spirited former classmate and now teacher at an alternative school, introduces her to Jeremiah Balakian (Nat Wolff), a brilliant young man who may be the child she gave up for adoption seventeen years ago. “Admission” is familiar enough to not jar the sensibilities of undemanding rom com fans, but there is more here than immediately meets the eye.
2. The Bling Ring: Based on actual events, “The Bling Ring” centers around a group of narcissistic Los Angeles area teenagers, Rebecca (Katie Chang), Marc (Israel Broussard), Nicki (Emma Watson), Sam (Taissa Fermiga) and Chloe (Claire Julien).
Their modus operandi? They track the comings and goings of their favorite celebs on via internet. While one-named millennial stars like Paris, Lindsay, Megan or Audrina are out on the town or out of town completely, the Ring “go shopping,” breaking into their homes and help themselves to jewels, designer clothes and loose cash. More than that, they live vicariously through the lives of the rich and famous folks they’re burgling.
“The Bling Ring” plays like a “Law & Order” episode of “The Hills.” The crime spree is device that keeps the story moving forward, but the fascinating thing is the portrait of these self-absorbed kids who aspire to hosting reality shows or becoming a “lifestyle brand” as a career. They want fame and money, but are so tied up with the idea of fame and money they are blind to virtually everything else.
“The Bling Ring” is a fascinating art-house glimpse of fame found, just not the fame the thieving teens sought. They are the robbers TMZ made famous, a group of kids who redefined narcissism in an already narcissistic town.
3. The East: Britt Marling stars as corporate spy Jane Owen, code name Sarah. Her latest job involves going deep undercover to infiltrate a shadowy group of eco-terrorists called The East. The collective—think real life activists Anonymous—run by the charismatic anarchist Benji (Alexander Skarsgård), is on the eve of their biggest demonstration yet, an act of sabotage that will make headlines and make a very public statement of their anti-corporate stance.
Sarah is accepted by the group, save for the truculent Izzy (Ellen Page), and begins to develop Stockholm syndrome. Or does she?
It’s a morally complex movie, with Sarah at the center of the ethical hurricane as she starts to question her role as both a spy and a would-be member of the radical group. She weighs the morality of both sides and… well, go see the movie.
“The East” deliberately paints shades of grey into the story, allowing for good and bad, evil and sympathetic characters on both sides. It may be too nuanced for folks who like their spy stories to take sides, but Sarah, as the source of the plot’s push-and-pull, is too complex a creation to play it straight. Marling brings strength and fighting spirit to Sarah in a performance that could finally make her a star.
4. The Iceman: Based on “The Iceman: The True Story of a Cold-Blooded Killer” by crime writer Anthony Bruno the movie begins on Kuklinski’s first date with his wife to be Deborah (Winona Ryder). He’s quiet and reserved, but charming and she is won over by his charisma. They marry, have kids and lead a normal life. At least at home. Deborah had no idea her mild mannered husband was an expert assassin, who paid for the kid’s private school and her jewels by slicing throats, shooting and choking the enemies of his boss Roy DeMeo (Ray Liotta).
Kuklinski was dubbed the Iceman for two reasons. When he was arrested police found a stash of bodies he had frozen to obscure time of death and because of his icy demeanor. It’s a role Shannon was born to play. From certain angles he looks like an everyman, the kind of guy who goes home at night to his wife and two kids. From other angles he’s menacing, the kind of guy you don’t want to meet in a dark alley.
Shannon is cooler than Mr. Freeze as the title character in “The Iceman,” and he’s joined by Chris Evans in a career making performance as a ice cream truck driving killer, Liotta in mobster mode—between Shannon and Liotta it’s a showdown of the steely stares—the welcome return of Wynonna Ryder and David Schwimmer playing against type as a slimy mafia enforcer.
5. The Last Stand: Near the beginning of the movie the head lawman of the sleepy border town of Summerton Junction, Sheriff Ray Owens (Arnold Schwarzenegger), says, “Should be a quiet weekend.” Of course whenever Arnold, or any eighties action star says, “Should be a quiet weekend,” you know all hell is about to break loose. And break loose it does.
In a parallel story ruthless drug lord Gabriel Cortez (Eduardo Noriega) stages an elaborate escape and heads for the Mexican border, which just happens to lie outside Arnold’s… er… Owens’s town. As Cortez speeds toward the border he has a quick cell phone call with Owens. “Do you wanna play?,” he yells. “Let’s play!” And play they do… with big guns.
Schwarzenegger is moving noticeably slower these days—How are you Sheriff? “Old,” he says.—but his comic timing is still there and no one else can battle through this kind of cheesefest and emerge with his action cred intact.
“The Last Stand” is not a movie to be taken seriously, but it wasn’t made to be taken seriously. Why else would cult director Jee-woon Kim cast Johnny Knoxville?
6. The Lone Ranger: Set against a backdrop of corruption during the building of the railway’s westward expansion through Native American territory, this is the origin story of how attorney John Reid (Armie Hammer), a law and order man who doesn’t believe in vengeance, met Tonto (Johnny Depp) and became the Wild West’s masked crusader.
The unlikely pair are brought together by their mutual enmity toward Butch Cavendish (William Fichtner), a cannibalistic outlaw who Reid wants to bring to justice and Tonto wants dead. That pursuit uncovers massive corruption during the building of the railway’s westward expansion through Native American territory beginning with a conspiracy to start a war between the US Calvary and the Comanche Nation.
“The Lone Ranger” is state of the art nouveau Western, complete with circling vultures, unspoiled landscapes, gruff, unshaven men and even a beer drinking horse. Surprisingly nimble footed for a two-and-a-half hour epic, it is unexpectedly funny but more violent than your typical summer tent pole flick.
7. Pacific Rim: Director Guillermo Del Toro has made an end-of-the-world scenario fun.
In the world he creates in “Pacific Rim” the planet is threatened with destruction by Kaijus, colossal beasts with an appetite for destruction. Coming to our world through a breach in a portal beneath the Pacific Ocean, the earth is losing the war against these beasts. The main of line of defense, giant robots called Jaegers—operated by pilots who mind meld with the metal behemoths; the deeper the connection, the better they fight—are being decommissioned in favor of a giant wall. “Kaijus are evolving,” says one military man, “and we’re losing Jaegers faster than we can build them.”
In the months before the machines are made obsolete a driven colonel, Stacker Pentecost (Idris Alba), assembles a crack team of Jaeger pilots—including burned out former pilot Raleigh Becket (Charlie “Sons of Anarchy” Hunnam) and talented but untested trainee Mako Mori (Rinko Kikuchi) to launch one last attack to close the portal and save the planet.
Del Toro has supersized a Godzilla story, adding in 50s b-movie tropes with state of the art sci fi to create something fresh. It’s a thrill ride from the beginning, a giant action movie that doesn’t just rely on a cool premise.
In other words, “Battleship” this ain’t.
8. Pain and Gain: Near the beginning a voiceover says, “Unfortunately, this is based on a true story.” It’s the real-life tale of three Miami-based body builders (Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne Johnson, and Anthony Mackie) chasing the American Dream. Pumped up and steroid crazy they abduct a prominent local businessman (Tony Shalhoub). They beat and torture the self-made millionaire until he signs over all his wealth—houses, cars, boats and money. The story eventually becomes so outlandish Bay flashes up a graphic in the last half hour reminding us that this is “still a true story.”
This is a seriously weird movie. It’s Bay working with a tiny—for him—budget of just $26 million. The guy has made commercials that cost more than that, but has delivered the darkest comedy—imagine if the Coen Brothers did gruesome slapstick—to come down the pike in a while.
9. Rush: When we first meet Niki Lauda (Daniel Brühl) and James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) they are third stringers, talented Formula 3 drivers desperate for a chance to move up to the big show. Lauda makes a financial deal that lands him on Team Ferrari while Hunt uses tenacity, charm and a touch of desperation to grab a spot with the McLaren team.
Bad blood flows between the two, stemming back to an incident when Hunt edged Lauda off the track the first time they faced off against one another. That rivalry spills over from the track as the two engage in name-calling and spar in the press.
In the 1976 season Lauda seems unstoppable, a sure bet to reclaim his World Champion title. Then tragedy strikes as Lauda is badly burned in a fiery crash. During his recuperation Hunt rises in the ranks, leading to a showdown, just 50 days after Lauda’s accident, for the World Championship at the Japan Grand Prix.
“Rush” is more than “Rocky” on four wheels, it’s an exhilarating, stylish film with pedal-to-the-metal verve.
10. The Sapphires: The year is 1968. Dave Lovelace is an English (Chris O’Dowd) piano player with a love for Otis Redding and booze. While hosting a talent show in remote Australia hosting he discovers three sisters, Cynthia (Miranda Tapsekll), Gail (Deborah Mailman), Julie (Jessica Mauboy), with amazing voices but a tired country and western style repertoire. Adding cousin Kay (Shari Sebbens) as background singer and dance captain, he molds them into the Australian Supremes and gets them their first gigs—in Vietnam singing for the troops.
“The Sapphires” is a feel good movie that succeeds despite the cliché story. It’s based—one imagines very loosely based—on a true story, but make no mistake, this is a Hollywood-ized (filtered through an Australian sensibility) version of the tale.
Authenticity aside, it’s the performances and the music that make “The Sapphires” worth a look. We first noticed O’Dowd on this side of the Atlantic as the charming love interest in “Bridesmaids.” He brings it again in “The Sapphires,” mixing roguish appeal with bang on comic timing.
“The Sapphires” is a slight, but entertaining take on the effect of music to change people’s lives.
11. The To Do List: High school valedictorian Brandy Klark (Aubrey Plaza) is an overachiever. She’s the publisher of her own magazine, Women With a Y, a straight A student with a full scholarship to Georgetown University and has a Perfect Attendance certificate proudly hanging on her wall.
She’s also a virgin, a status she hopes to change soon with the help of Rusty Waters (Scott Porter), a college surfer stud with a perfect smile. Attacking her new project with the gusto that won her accolades in school, she gets the advice of friends and family (Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Alia Shawkat, Sarah Steele and Rachel Bilson) and makes up a “to do” list, applying the same zeal that made her a mathlete to losing her virginity.
Telling the story from a female point of view is a nice turnaround from the usual boycentric sex comedy story.
“The To Do List” is endearingly off-kilter, a different take on the “Porky’s” style of sexual coming-of-age stories usually that are usually headlined by the male members of the cast. I wish it was a bit shorter—did they really need 100 minutes to tell this story?—and a bit funnier, but for anyone who came of age just as The New Kids on the Block were calling it quits (for the first time) there is much to enjoy here.
12. Warm Bodies: Nicholas Hoult plays R (pronounced “arrgghhgghh”), an existential zombie who wants more out of life… or death, or whatever it is you call his current state. “Why can’t I connect with people?” he wonders in the narration. “Why is my posture so bad? Of yeah, I’m dead.” There’s been a plague of some sort which has left him and most of the population hungry for brains, while the sole human survivors live behind a giant wall.
Zombies and humans alike are terrified of the Bonies—evolved zombies who’ll eat anything with a heartbeat. “So will I,” says R, “but at least I’m conflicted about it.”
On a feeding trip R encounters a team of humans on the search for supplies. One zombie attack later he has eaten the brains of Perry (Dave Franco). When he gets a glimpse of Perry’s girlfriend Julie (Teresa Palmer) he loses his appetite. Perry’s memories come flooding into R’s zombie brain and he begins to feel something he hasn’t felt for a long time—human emotions.
It’s “Walking Dead” meets “Romeo and Juliet” with a twist—it just might be that love and hope can still set hearts a flutter, even ones that haven’t beaten in a while.
Any movie with the line, “I know it’s really hard to meet guys now… in the apocalypse and everything,” is OK by me.
13. You’re Next: On the occasion of their parents 35th wedding anniversary the Davidson kids and assorted wives, girl and boy friends gather at a remote Tudor mansion—is there any other type in these kinds of movies?—to enjoy dinner and one another, but instead end up in a fight for their lives. Only one of the guests, Erin (Sharni Vinson), has the know-how to protect herself, but will it be enough?
It’s hard to discuss “You’re Next,” which had its world premiere at the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival Midnight Madness program, without giving away a major plot twist, but I will say there is a Manson Family aspect to the story that really creeped me out. That plus the anxiety-inducing John Carpenter style score throbbing in the background and the “moist” sound effects accompanying the wet work. It’s all effective but it is the idea behind the movie that is truly disturbing.
There is a rawness to the filmmaking—and let’s just say that there are no future Meryl Streeps in the cast—that although there is very little actual gore, is chilling.
I don’t know what it says about my mental make-up, but I really liked “You’re Next.” It’s disturbing, violent and without any redeeming social value, but I enjoyed sitting in the theatre with my hands over my eyes, afraid of what I might see next. I’m not usually a fan of head trauma, but from what I saw as I peeked through my fingers, it works well.
The new Lynn Shelton film is a slow burn. The languidly paced story about a massage therapist (Rosemary DeWitt) with an aversion to touch, an awkward dentist (Josh Pais) with the ability to heal TMJ and his daughter, the directionless Jenny (Ellen Page), is a delicate creation. It’s a character study about fear of intimacy that makes up for the listless story with atmosphere and wonderful, naturalistic performances from the cast. Allison Janney shines as a Reiki master, but it is Page who breaks hearts as a woman with unrequited love for a man.
Touchy Feely brings Ellen Page full circle.
In the years since she was nominated for an Oscar for her performance in Juno, she has worked with directors Christopher Nolan, Woody Allen and Drew Barrymore, but Touchy Feely filmmaker Lynn Shelton asked her to do something she hasn’t done since her teens working in her hometown of Halifax—improvisation.
“I had done nothing remotely like improv since Trailer Park Boys,” she says.
“It was an intriguing challenge for me because it was completely stepping out of my comfort zone. There were some scenes she had written where she’d be pushing us to improvise because that’s what she likes, and I’d be like, ‘Lynne, the scene is great. I’m not going to improve on this, believe me.’”
The movie focuses on three relatives, a massage therapist with an aversion to touch, her dentist brother and Jenny, a character Page describes as having an “incredibly quiet, self contained, deep, deep sadness and fear and unwillingness to move forward in life.”
Page breathes life into the character and says she was “completely intrigued with her journey as a person” but what really keeps her going is trying new things.
“It’s funny because after certain things happen in your career and things change and etcetera, etcetera, etcetera there is definitely a mind set that tries to get put on you about the next move,” she says.
“I get all that but what is hands down the most important thing for me is that I feel inspired and serious and passionate and continue to feel ambitious.”
With a variety of projects in the works—including the Beyond: Two Souls video game and X-Men: Days of Future Past—Page is keeping it interesting by staying varied.
“I get paid to explore all kinds of things and it always feeds you in a way that is incredible. Any job I do I try and do everything I can to grow as an actor. I love what I do so I’m always trying to get better at it, always learn more from all of the amazing people I work with. The ability to get to go to work and feel so deeply—deep sadness, deep pain, joy, anger and feel that flow through you. To get to do that as your job is pretty incredible.”
Conventional Hollywood wisdom these days has it that audiences only want to see remakes, retreads and rehashes of old ideas. This summer has seen a seemingly endless parade of movies with the number 2 in the title and films based on 80s TV shows. Some have made money some have not, but every once and a while a movie comes along that proves Hollywood wrong. Last December “Avatar” showed that audiences would flock to a movie that wasn’t based on a videogame, existing novel or television show. It broke every box office record going and yet since then there has been a stream of derivative films clogging up the multiplex. Until now. Christopher Nolan’s “Inception” is a startlingly original film.
Set in a world where technology can invade people’s dreams, “Inception” stars Leonardo DiCaprio as Dom Cobb, the leader of a corporate espionage team who specialize in stealing valuable secrets from within people’s subconscious for profit. Cobb is an international fugitive tormented by dreams of his late wife (Marion Cotillard) who sees a way out of his personal nightmare if he takes on one last job offered to him by Saito (Ken Watanabe), a powerful businessman who can arrange for Cobb to skip past immigration and get back into the United States. All Cobb has to do is perform an “inception;” plant a thought in the mind of Robert Fischer (Cillian Murphy) CEO of a global corporation. (One writer has called it “the Great Brain Robbery.) Cobb and his team—Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), Eames (Tom Hardy), Yusuf (Dileep Rao) and Ariadne (Ellen Page), an architect who becomes Cobb’s new dream weaver—set out to implant the idea of dissolving his multibillion-dollar business into Fischer’s dreams.
“Inception” is the most innovative sci fi film to come out of Hollywood since “The Matrix” way back in 1999. It’s a movie that takes ideas very seriously—ideas drive the plot—and, as a result, takes its audience seriously. It never talks down to the crowd and in return demands viewers to pay attention. For those who do there are many rewards, and for those who aren’t willing to get drawn into the surreal story there are still many pleasures. That’s how finely crafted this movie is.
“Dark Knight” director Christopher Nolan (who also wrote the script) proves he can blow the doors off with the action—Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s MC Eischeresque gravity defying fight scene is a mind blower—and also handle the cerebral stuff.
He creates and juggles several worlds—dreams within dreams, worlds within worlds—until it becomes difficult to tell what is real and what isn’t. Each of these worlds comes complete with their own rules—five minutes in real life equals one hour in dream time, for instance—and is populated with well rounded, complex characters. The visuals are very cool—check out the streets that defy physics and curl over on top of one another—but amazing effects don’t mean much if the people interacting with them aren’t interesting. Nolan has put a great deal of effort into the look of the movie and its ideas but he never forgets the characters, who are the film’s single biggest asset.
Like the very best sci fi “Inception” is thoughtful, intelligent, audacious and humanistic. It’s also one of the year’s best films of any genre.
If you‘ve been paying attention to the Critic’s Awards lists that are coming out all over the place these days you’ve probably noticed a name you probably aren’t familiar with popping up here and there. It’s Ellen Page, a young Haligonian who in recent months has become Hollywood’s “It-Girl.” You’ve glimpsed her in X-Men 3, maybe heard the buzz out of Sundance for Hard Candy and TIFF for The Tracey Fragments, but up until now it’s been hard to put a face to the name. Juno should change all that.
Directed by Thank You For Smoking’s Jason Reitman, Juno is an screwball comedy about a pregnant sixteen year old who decides to give up her baby to a young, seemingly perfect childless couple. Reitman, working from a script by the excellently named Diablo Cody, handles the material with the ease of someone who grew up around comedy—his father is Ghostbuster’s director Ivan Reitman.
Despite the hip and impossibly witty dialogue—almost every line sounds like a punch line and is so slick it threatens to teeter over into “so hip it hurts” territory—Reitman and Page manage to ground this story, keeping it funny but also injecting a goodly amount of humanity into the proceedings. That’s a good thing because when you have, for example, a convenience store clerk (played by Rainn Wilson of The Office) watching Juno shaking her pregnancy test and saying lines like: “That ain’t no etch-a-sketch. That’s one doodle that can’t be undid, homeskillet,” there better be strong grounding or the movie could degrade into a quirky Napoleon Dynamite wannabe and little else.
The movie’s secret weapon is Page who carefully portrays the spunky Juno MacGuff not just as a smart-mouthed teen who got herself in the family way by seducing her high school crush, but as a complicated young woman who uses her wit as a wall to protect herself from the harsh realities of life.
Bouncing off Page are Brampton, Ontario’s Michael Cera, fresh off his turn in the hilarious Superbad, playing the kind of sensitive teenager not often seen on screen and great supporting work by Jennifer Garner, Jason Bateman, J.K. Simmons and Allison Janney. They’re all great, but make no mistake; this is Page’s movie from top to bottom.
“The East” is a new political thriller that plays like a mix between “The Bourne Identity” and “Tailor Tinker Soldier Spy.” That is to say, it’s a tense thriller that values smarts over action.
Britt Marling stars as corporate spy Jane Owen, code name Sarah. Her latest job involves going deep undercover to infiltrate a shadowy group of eco-terrorists called The East. The collective—think real life activists Anonymous—run by the charismatic anarchist Benji (Alexander Skarsgård), is on the eve of their biggest demonstration yet, an act of sabotage that will make headlines and make a very public statement of their anti-corporate stance.
Sarah is accepted by the group, save for the truculent Izzy (Ellen Page), and begins to develop Stockholm syndrome. Or does she?
It’s a morally complex movie, with Sarah at the center of the ethical hurricane as she starts to question her role as both a spy and a would-be member of the radical group. She weighs the morality of both sides and… well, go see the movie.
“The East” deliberately paints shades of grey into the story, allowing for good and bad, evil and sympathetic characters on both sides. It may be too nuanced for folks who like their spy stories to take sides, but Sarah, as the source of the plot’s push-and-pull, is too complex a creation to play it straight. Marling brings strength and fighting spirit to Sarah in a performance that could finally make her a star.
“The East” has good performances all round—Skarsgård and Page are particularly effective—and there’s enough turns to hold interest, although the events leading up the final showdown lack credibility. Nonetheless, it’s good, thought provoking stuff that doesn’t look for easy or obvious answers.
At the center of Smart People is one of those curmudgeonly professor characters so self-absorbed, so pedantic it’s almost impossible to like him. He’s intelligent, but if there ever was a human embodiment of the saying “too smart for his own good” this is it. He pretentiously drones on and on about Victorian literature. He’s the kind of guy who says, “adopted brother,” when introducing Chuck (Thomas Haden Church), his middle-aged sibling. He’s a widower and we get the impression early on that the only person he could relate to was his late wife and with her gone he is completely socially adrift. In real life you wouldn’t want to spend one second with Lawrence Wetherhold, but as portrayed by Dennis Quaid he’s a compelling character who sets a number of storylines in motion.
He’s the patriarch of a suitably quirky family. Daughter Vanessa (Ellen Page) is an acid-tongued neo-con brainiac—think Ann Coulter only slightly less annoying—who longs for the glory days of Ronald Reagan and is obsessed with acing her SATs. Son James (Ashton Holmes) is distant—think every underwritten troubled teenage character you’ve ever seen on film—living in the shadow of his brilliant father and sister. The professor cares more for his unpublished manuscript than his kids or his students. He is shaken out of his mid-life self-pitying trance when his brother—adopted brother, that is—and a former student in the form of Dr. Janet Hartigan (Sarah Jessica Parker)—who works at the least busy ER ever seen on film—enter his life.
Five minutes into Smart People you know that the characters will emerge on the other end as better people, enriched in unlikely ways from unlikely sources; it’s that kind of movie. Since there are very few surprises (although there are a couple of unusual twists) in the story it’s up to the characters to carry the show. Luckily Smart People can boast a solid cast doing good work.
At the helm is Dennis Quaid who has thrown vanity out the window to play the paunchy professor. His leading man good looks still sneak through a scraggly beard and lined face, but the cocky swagger of past roles like Remy McSwain in The Big Easy or Great Balls of Fire’s Jerry Lee Lewis has been replaced with a limping gait. It looks good on him. It’s a role where character is utmost and his world weary take on the pompous professor is spot on.
Ellen Page, the Halifax-born Hollywood “It-Girl” hands in another nice performance. Her take on Vanessa is the polar opposite of the free-spirited character she played in Juno, which earned her an Academy Award nomination this year. She’s a Young Republican of the Alex P. Keaton School, complete with portraits of Ronald Reagan on her bedroom walls. She could easily be a conservative caricature but Page digs a little deeper and gives Vanessa insecurities and weaknesses that lie just under the surface of her carefully manicured Fox News façade.
In the supporting roles Sarah Jessica Parker is solid but gets steamrolled by a scene stealing Thomas Hayden Church as Chuck the down-on-his-luck brother. Wetherhold refers to him as a “giant toddler” and he’s always grasping at some kind of get rich quick scheme, but in his own homespun way he has far more understanding of the human condition than either of his more learned relatives. It’s his light touch, reminiscent of his work in Sideways, which gives Smart People its best moments.
Smart People is a well-written film with sparkling dialogue and good actors who know how to deliver the material. Best of all it’s peppered with laughs and doesn’t try that hard to be heartwarming.
