Richard and CTV NewsChannel anchor Angie Seth discuss the family drama of “Tammy’s Always Dying,” the Cronenberg remake “Rabid,” the social commentary of “Blood Quantum” and the culinary adventure “Nose to Tail.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
Richard and CP24 anchor Nick Dixon have a look at the new movies coming to VOD and streaming services including drunken dramedy “Tammy’s Always Dying,” the Cronenberg remake “Rabid” and the zombie braaiiiins of “Blood Quantum.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
Richard sits in on the CFRA Ottawa morning show with host Bill Carroll to talk the new movies coming to VOD and streaming services including the drunken dramedy “Tammy’s Always Dying,” the Cronenberg remake “Rabid,” the guts and glory of “Blood Quantum” and the restaurant drama “Nose to Tail.”
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
At the bar Tammy (Felicity Huffman) is what’s known as a character. “I’m not a good person,” she says. “I’m a good time.” She’s always the life of the party, with a drink in her hand and a quip on her lips. When she’s too broke to afford booze she’s making her daughter Kathy’s (Anastasia Phillips) life miserable. Every month, when the money from her welfare cheque has run dry, Tammy goes through the same charade of marching down to the local bridge with the intention of ending it all. Kathy inevitably comes to the rescue and life goes on, repeating the cycle day in and out.
Kathy’s only respite from her mother’s lifestyle is a game of make believe she plays with her boss and old family friend, Doug (Clark Johnson). The two get dolled up, head to a fancy city bar and role play, pretending to be other, happier people. Their friendly bartender Jamie (Kristian Bruun) is in on the joke, and always goes along for the ride.
Just when it seems that Kathy is able to step away from the shadow of her mother’s influence, Tammy is diagnosed with terminal cancer. As a caregiver she’s drawn back into Tammy’s chaotic orbit but salvation may be around the corner. Television host Gordon Baker (Ali Hassan), a mix-and-match of Jerry Springer and Dr. Phil, is interested in the trashy aspects of Kathy’s story, and if she tells it well enough—with tears and all—he’s willing to make it worth her while.
“Tammy’s Always Dying” is a compelling character study anchored by remarkable performances. Huffman, almost unrecognizable as the narcissistic title character, makes sure that Tammy isn’t just a drunken spectacle, staggering through the film with a cigarette in one hand and a drink in the other. She brings humanity to a character who could have been a foul-mouthed Foster Brooks style caricature. As Kathy, Phillips finds the balance between heartfelt love for her mother and hatred for the way she has been treated. It’s a tricky balance but Phillips finds it in a carefully calibrated performance that generates much sympathy as Kathy carves a future for herself despite dire circumstances.
It’s not all doom and gloom. Bruun and Johnson provide a respite from the misery, giving the film two characters who try and improve Kathy’s life without controlling her.
In the hands of actor-turned-director Amy Jo Johnson (working from a script by Joanne Sarazen) “Tammy’s Always Dying” transcends poverty porn by presenting characters whose struggles feel real and fully realized. It’s a tough talking movie—“Killing herself would be the least selfish thing she’s ever done!”—that, underneath its bluster, has a tender beating heart.
Richard joins CJAD morning host Andrew Carter to talk about the big entertainment stories of the day. Today Richard and Andrew discuss why Fleetwood Mac is postponing some Canadian dates, the plot of “Avengers: Endgame” and why Felicity Huffman plead guilty in college admissions scandal.
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
In the new dramedy from director Garry Marshall, Lindsay Lohan plays Rachel, a young foul-mouthed booze-hound with a rebellious streak. In other words, if you believe TMZ.com and the other gossip rags, it’s art imitating life.
Instead of shipping her off to a teen boot camp her mother (Felicity Huffman) does something much worse. She arranges for Rachel to stay with her grandmother (Jane Fonda) in the hopes that some good old fashioned common sense will do the girl some good. Grandma Georgia is a bit of a tyrant, a woman who lives by a very strict moral code, propped up with more rules than Carter has little liver pills.
At first Rachel doesn’t seem cut out for small town life. She seduces a local Mormon boy, is rude to everyone and dresses as though she’s about to go clubbing on the Sunset Strip, not to a potluck supper at the local church. When a dark secret is revealed about her past, we begin to understand why she is such a handful, but it could have serious repercussions for everyone in her life.
The trailer for Georgia Rule makes it look like a heart-warming comedy, but that’s a bit misleading. There are some laughs, but the dark subject matter, including alcoholism, nymphomania and child molestation, keep the tone of the movie on the heavy-duty side. Marshall has been down this road before, he did, after all make a feel-good movie about prostitution called Pretty Woman, but here his instincts let him down. The characters are all too shrill to bond with an audience; the cross generational relationships are way too two dimensional; the supporting characters are little more than plot devices to move the story from point “a” to point “b” and the all-is-well-that-ends-well final act rings false.
His best move was the casting of Lohan in the Lolita role. She plays off her tabloid image nicely, although overall her Rachel is a little one-note. To be fair, it’s not really her fault. The script gives her little to do other than play that old chestnut, the spoiled brat who is actually wise and wonderful underneath the heavy veil of her snotty attitude.
Huffman brings more to her role as a desperate mother, daughter and wife, trying to sort out the mess she’s made of her life, while at the same time trying to salvage what’s left of her shredded relationships with Rachel and Georgia. Fonda fares better as the cantankerous moral center of the film. In some scenes she seems to be channeling her father’s famous “old coot” role in On Golden Pond.
Ultimately though, Georgia Rule is Lohan’s movie, and while it doesn’t shed much light on the character in the film, it may offer a glimpse of what it’s like hang out with Lohan on a Saturday night.
As the stressed out Lynette Scavo on Desperate Housewives Felicity Huffman is one of the most recognizable women on television, but I would guess that not even her biggest fans would recognize her in Transamerica, out this week on DVD. In her Oscar nominated role she plays Bree, a pre-operative transsexual about to undergo the final stages of her transformation from male to female when she discovers that she has a son from a long-ago tryst—when she was still a biological man named Stanley. Huffman disappears into the character, playing Bree as an introverted button-down conservative, particular about grammar and manners who owns up to the responsibility she feels to her son. The better part of the movie is spent on the road as the Bree and her son get to know one another on a drive from New York to Los Angeles.
Transamerica’s greatest asset is Huffman who brings humanity to a role that could have been a stereotype.
