I join CTV Atlantic’s Bruce Frisco to talk about the playful “Toy Story 5,” the grim historical drama “The Death of Robin Hood” and the supernatural horrors of “Leviticus.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
I join “CP24 Breakfast” hosts Nick Dixon and Jennifer Hsiung to talk about the playful “Toy Story 5” and the grim historical drama “The Death of Robin Hood.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
I review “Toy Story 5” for ctvnews.ca: “By the time a franchise gets to the fifth instalment it’s usually a case of diminishing returns. The further you get from the source, the worse the movie. Luckily, “Toy Story 5” defies traditional wisdom, delivering a movie for the whole family that brims with heart and humour…” Read the whole thing HERE!
Fast reviews for busy people! Watch as I review three movies in less time than it takes to brush your teeth. Have a look as I race against the clock to tell you about the playful “Toy Story 5,” the grim historical drama “The Death of Robin Hood” and the supernatural horrors of “Leviticus.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
SYNOPSIS: In “Toy Story 5,” the new Pixar animated film now in theatres, eight-year-old Bonnie shifts from tradition toys to a newfangled tablet.
CAST: Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, Joan Cusack, Tony Hale, Annie Potts, John Ratzenberger, Wallace Shawn, Blake Clark, Keanu Reeves, Bonnie Hunt, Kristen Schaal, Ernie Hudson, Melissa Villaseñor, Greta Lee, Conan O’Brien, Craig Robinson, Shelby Rabara, Matty Matheson, Bad Bunny. Directed by Andrew Stanton.
REVIEW: By the time a franchise gets to the fifth instalment it is usually a case of diminishing returns. The further you get from the source, the worse the movie. Luckily, “Toy Story 5” defies traditional wisdom, delivering a movie for the whole family that brims with heart and humor.
The story revolves around lonely eight-year-old Bonnie (Scarlett Spears), the only kid on the block who still plays with toys, like the cowgirl rag doll Jessie (Joan Cusack) and superhero action hero Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen). The other kids spend their time on their screens and don’t have time for a girl who still plays with dolls.
Hoping to help her fit in, Bonnie’s parents (Lori Alan and Jay Hernandez) buy her a Lilypad (Greta Lee), a frog-shaped smart tablet that comes complete with games, chat rooms, social media and a very assertive attitude.
“Once tech enters your home,” says tech-phobic toy Dr. Nutcase (voiced by Matty Matheson), “it’s over.”
As Bonnie plays games and joins chat rooms on the device she spends less and less time with Jessie and the other toys.
“Extinction!” yelps Rex the dinosaur (Wallace Shawn). “Not again!”
With the help of a team of Buzz Lightyears and cowboy ragdoll Woody (Tom Hanks), who returns from rescuing abandoned toys, Jessie sets off to make sure Bonnie makes new friends, without forgetting about her toy pals.
“Playing games isn’t play,” Woody says.
“Toy Story 5” isn’t the old man of the franchise, yelling at tech to get off their lawn. Nor is it a story about the evils of tech. Instead, it’s a testament to the power of imagination.
It’s about screens vs. imagination and the joys that come when an unstructured young mind is allowed to run wild, to create and learn. But the screenplay, by Andrew Stanton and Kenna Harris, doesn’t dismiss the place of passive tech in the modern world, it simply favors playtime over screen time.
As a movie, “Toy Story 5” has a sense of play about itself. Like the best of Pixar, it tackles real world issues like on-line bullying, insecurity (“What if am I just no good at being a toy?” asks Jessie.), the value of childhood memories and what true friends are but does so in a way that never feels maudlin. Director Stanton keeps things lively, pulling fun voice work from the returning cast, plus new additions like Conan O’Brien who has a blast voicing Smarty Pants, a toilet training tablet, and inserting some self-aware jokes, like depicting Woody, presumably the oldest of the toys, with a bald spot.
Add to that, beautiful cinematic visuals, with state-of-the-art 3D computer animation embellished with a lovely, handcrafted look for the imagination scenes, and you have a fine addition to the “Toy Story” franchise, rich in timely themes of the effects of tech on blossoming minds but never preachy or pedantic.
I join CHUM-FM’s Marilyn Denis and David Corey to talk about “Toy Story 5,” “The Odyssey” and why people are going back to the movies!
Listen to the whole thing HERE!
See video HERE!
In future edition of your Funk & Wagnalls the entry for ‘heartfelt’ may well be illustrated with the poster for “Instant Family.” For better and for worse the new Mark Wahlberg film is an earnest and deeply felt look at adoption out of the foster care system.
Wahlberg and Rose Byrne are house flippers Pete and Ellie. Childless, they are forty-somethings with a well-appointed, orderly life. When the subject of kids comes up, raised by Ellie’s sister, Pete worries about being an ”old dad.” He jokes about adopting a five year old so “it will be like I got cracking when I was thirty-six years old.” That one off hand comment triggers something in Ellie who researches the stats on foster kids and is immediately inspired to help by welcoming children into their home. Pete isn’t as sure. “People who take foster kids are special,” he says. “The kind of people who volunteer when it isn’t even a holiday. We’re not that special.” Later, after looking at a website of photos of kids available for adoption he relents. “This is what we do,” he says, “fix things up. We’ll scrape off their emotional popcorn ceiling.”
The couple attend Foster Parent Classes run by social workers Karen (Octavia Spencer) and Sharon (Tig Notaro) and, when at a Child Fair they meet the forceful fifteen-year-old Lizzy (Isabela Moner) and her siblings, accident prone Juan (Gustavo Quiroz) and the sweet but screechy Lita (Julianna Gamiz). Drawn to them, Pete and Ellie knew their “cosmic connection” was much more than a hunch; that this group must somehow form a family. That’s the way we they became, well, not exactly the Brady bunch, but a family with all the good and bad that entails.
There are parts of “Instant Family” that will make you laugh and parts that will make you cry. Then there are the other parts. Director Sean Anders—who, in real life adopted three children from foster care—clearly cares about making a difference with this film. As the writer of “Hot Tub Time Machine” and “We’re the Millers” he’s comfortable with finding humour in situations, and he’s explored family dynamics in as the writer and director of “Daddy’s Home.” Here he adds in a third element, the Public Service Announcement.
Spencer and Notaro are tasked with delivering the cold hard facts and figures that shine a light on the difficulty of children in foster care, and they do the best they can with it, but early on it often feels as though you are reading an informational pamphlet from one of their Foster Parent Classes and not enjoying a family dramedy. Once past that you’re left with a pleasing story of a hard-earned connection between adoptive parents and their new kids.
“Instant Family’s” heart is in the right place and that goodwill goes a long way. The relationship between Wahlberg, Byrne and the kids isn’t all sunshine and roses. They have real problems and work through them by trail and error, sometimes with hilarious results, sometimes not. Either way they feel universal—every parent has had to calm a tantrum in public, etc—even though the story is very specific.
“Snatched” is a mother and daughter comedy. Sounds wholesome, right? Mom and daughter on holiday, but add in kidnapping, sex trafficking and manual tapeworm extraction and you have a raunchy comedy that plays like a cross between “Taken” and “Steel Magnolias.”
Amy Schumer is Emily Middleton, a sales clerk with no filter who over-shares with customers. On the eve of an Ecuadorian vacation her musician boyfriend (Randall Park) dumps her, leaving her with two plane tickets and a South American hotel with a king sized bed. Rather than cancel the trip Emily asks her divorced, retiree mother Linda (Goldie Hawn) to come along for the ride.
“Pack your bags,” Emily says, “we’re going to South America.”
“Everybody knows you need two years to plan a vacation,” says her cautious mom.
Linda is a worrywart, as uptight as Emily is free spirited. She’s the kind of person who triple locks her suburban doors and checks websites for nearby sex offenders.
To convince mom to come along for the ride Emily pulls the one card her mother can’t refuse. “The trip is non-refundable.”
In Ecuador Emily meets James (Tom Bateman), a handsome English man who sweeps her off her feet. On a day trip he convinces Emily and Linda to take the scenic route back to the hotel only to stand by as the women are abducted. Their captor is Morgado (Óscar Jaenada), a notorious gangster who holds them for $100,000 ransom. One daring escape later they are off on their own in the Columbian jungle, trying to make it to the American consulate in Bogotá. On their trip they are aided by Roger Simmons (Christopher Meloni), an explorer who seems to have just stepped out of a 1950 adventure film and two friends from the resort, Ruth (Wanda Sykes) and Barb (Joan Cusack).
Back home Jeffrey Middleton (Ike Barinholtz), Linda’s agoraphobic son convinces a reluctant State Department official (Bashir Salahuddin) to get involved.
At its dirty little heart “Snatched” is a movie about the importance of family, specifically the bond between mother and daughter but it’s not all sweetness and light. The film is inhabited by comic creations that are grounded enough to prevent the movie from careening into farce, but not so grounded that they can’t surprise us.
In her first movie role in fifteen years Hawn reminds us of what a gifted comedienne she is, spouting lines like, “I tell you when dad left I thought I’d never have sex again… and I was right,” with pitch perfect comic timing.
Schumer’s self-depreciating humour—“The sex traders want beautiful women. Your poufy faces will protect you.”—is relatable but it is her more subtle character work that really shines here. Little things, like the way she tries to take the perfect selfie, tell us everything we need to know about the self-indulgent Emily without a line of dialogue.
Sykes, Cusack, Barinholtz and Meloni all bring the funny in a series of off kilter cameos.
“Snatched” isn’t exactly a laugh-a-minute, it’s more a giggle followed by a laugh every few minutes but director Jonathan Levine (“Warm Bodies,” “The Night Before” and “50/50”) has a good grasp of the humour, action and mushy stuff, finding a pleasing balance between all three.
Is Kristen Wiig the most daring actress in Hollywood? After having been an all-star utility player on “Saturday Night Live” for 9 years and the massive success of “Bridesmaids” she could have written her own ticket. She could have reteamed with Melissa McCarthy to make the expected follow-up to “Bridesmaids,” or even played a Marvel superhero. She could have paired off with Will Ferrell and made big budget big screen comedies or elbowed Sandra Bullock out of the way and starred in “The Heat.”
Instead she has kept a low profile, making challenging, quirky films that mix mirth with melancholy and are unlikely to gross even “Bridesmaids’s” catering cost.
She returns as Alice Klieg in “Welcome to Me,” a dark comedy about a woman with Borderline Personality Disorder and a dream of being on television. Divorced, she lives in a small apartment, sleeping in a sleeping bag on top of the bed, in front of a television that hasn’t been turned off in eleven years.
She mouths along with Oprah reruns and dreams, one day, of sharing herself and her ideas with the world. Her dream becomes a possibility when she wins an $87 million lottery. Using the facilities of a failing TV infomercial studio run by Gabe (Wes Bentley) and Rich (James Marsden), she buys herself a show unlike anything that has ever been seen on TV. Titled “Welcome to Me,” it’s a puzzling glimpse into her life. “Today I woke up and there was a public hair on my pillow shaped like a question mark,” she says introducing a segment called Unanswered Questions. For a week straight she neuters dogs live on air. The show, which airs so high on the dial it’s just above the Alien Channel, becomes a mini sensation with people tuning in to see the unusual mix of tortured revelations and performance art. One student credits her with the invention of “the narrative infomercial.”
As the show gains in popularity Alice’s ego bloats but success doesn’t make her happy, and eventually she is stripped bare, both emotionally and physically.
Brave, dynamic work like this separates Wiig from the pack. In a high wire performance she balances playing someone dealing with severe mental health issues while earning laughs along the way. It’s tough to do, but in what is her best work yet she rides the line, never backing off the tough stuff but also frequently taking a sideways step toward the laughs.
Other characters aren’t given as much of a chance to shine–Jennifer Jason Leigh as the show’s designer is cut adrift but Joan Cusack makes the best of an underwritten role as the show’s director—but as Alice’s best friend Linda Cardinelli is equal parts warmth and frustration, and perfect in the role.
“Welcome to Me” is a nervy and showcase for Wiig.
