“Leap Year”, a new opposites-attract-romantic-comedy, stars Amy Adams and Matthew Goode as the metaphoric oil and water. She’s a perfectionist, he isn’t. She pushy, he’s laid back. She doesn’t do quaint very well, he’s… well, quaint. It’s the standard rom com set up, but instead of the usual New York setting director Anand Tucker places the action in the picturesque Irish country side.
The action begins in Boston where uptight Anna (Adams) has become tired of waiting for her yuppie-scum cardiologist boyfriend of four years to propose. Taking matter into her own hands and citing an obscure Irish tradition that declares it impossible for a man to refuse a woman’s proposal on Leap Day she decides to ambush him on February 29 while he is in Dublin on business. Delayed by bad weather she lands in a remote Irish village and begins the long road trip to Dublin accompanied by Declan (Goode), a rough hewn local who agrees to take her to the big city in return for enough money to save his failing pub.
Rom coms are predictable beasts. We know who is going to end up with who, because if we don’t, I guess it would be a romantic suspense movie and who would pay to see that? The trick to making an effective rom com is to keep the ride interesting all the up to the final, and inevitable, loving embrace between the two leads. At this “Leap Year” is only partially successful.
Adams and Goode have the lion’s share of screen time and while they are both charming, good actors, neither is doing their best work here. Where is the interesting Adams of “Sunshine Cleaning”? Or “Enchanted’s” lovable Adams? For that matter as a love interest Goode was far more effective with one-tenth of the screen time in “A Single Man, “ and generated way more heat as Charles Ryder in the generally restrained “Brideshead Revisited” from a couple of years ago. Both put up a good fight but are beaten by material that is beneath them. Amy Adams deserves better than to share a scene with a herd of unresponsive cows.
Worst of all, for actors of Adams and Goode’s stature, neither really makes the material her or his own. I could imagine any number of actors playing these parts and for this movie to really work I shouldn’t have been able to imagine that the movie would have pretty much the same if it had starred Renee Zellweger and Gerard Butler.
“Leap Year” isn’t absolutely terrible, in fact for a January rom com it’s a step up from “New in Town” or “27 Dresses”, but it is really average; just another mildly amusing, predictable entry in a generally mindless genre that badly needs a shot in the arm. If only Quentin Tarantino would make a romantic comedy…
The new thriller “Stoker” has nothing to do with Bram Stoker or his most famous creation, Dracula, but something tells me Stoker himself might have enjoyed the strange sense of dread incubating deep within the story.
The first English language film from Korean master Chan-Wook Park, “Stoker” revolves around the Stoker family, or, more correctly, the remaining members of the clan. Father Richard (Dermot Mulroney) was tragically killed in a car accident on his daughter India’s (Mia Wasikowska) eighteenth birthday. Mom Evie (Nicole Kidman) is upset, but eager to move on once handsome Uncle Charlie (Matthew Goode) shows up after a long absence.
In fact, creepy Charlie is just a little too mysterious—he’s been away for too long—to be a benign figure in India or Evie’s life.
“Stoker” is a sexual-psychological drama with overtones of incest, mental illness and infidelity. In other words it’s the kind of film that could keep psychoanalysts busy for years. Question is, will it keep audiences entertained for two hours?
It’ll be up to each and every viewer to decide whether the film’s unusual feel will be for them. Here’s what you need to know: India is an artistic girl who passes the time reading science books and staring off into space. She doesn’t like to be touched and, since the death of her father, seems to have disconnected from everyone around her. She’s so sullen she makes Bella Swan seem lighthearted by comparison.
The movie strives to emulate India’s sense of withdrawal by creating a sense of disquiet in the viewer, akin to India’s unease. Long silences punctuate sentences, as the ethereally pale protagonist slowly seems to be losing her mind. Or is she? The line between reality and fantasy is deliberately blurred as India is forced to grow up rather quickly.
The stuff of mystery is very much in evidence. Charlie’s past is shrouded in secret, there’s odd letters found in an old desk, skeletons in the cupboard and mysterious glances galore, but this isn’t Agatha Christie. It’s a slow burn leading up to an unconventional climax.
It’s beautiful to look at—one transition from scene to scene sees Kidman’s flame hair turn into swamp reeds—but the deliberate aloofness of the characters and the story may be off putting for many.
The classic “Jack and the Beanstock” is given an epic twist by director Bryan “X-Men” Singer. Synopsis: The action in this epic retelling of Jack and the Beanstalk begins when the king’s advisor Roderick (Stanley Tucci) hatches a plot to steal an enchanted crown and the six magic beans that hold to key to opening a gateway between earth and Gantua, the land of the giants. Enter poor farmer Jack (Nicholas Hoult) who becomes involved when he unwittingly sows a seed that sprouts a giant beanstalk, literally shooting the princess Isabelle (Eleanor Tomlinson) skyward into the humungous hands of the giants. Determined to rescue her Jack battles the goliaths, wins the respect of the king and the love of a princess.
The first ever big screen mounting of the Evelyn Waugh novel Brideshead Revisited comes with great expectation. The book was chosen by Time as one of the “All-time 100 Novels” and the 1981 mini-series placed tenth in the 100 Greatest British Television Programs by the British Film Institute.
In the new version Matthew Goode is Charles Ryder, the role previously taken by Jeremy Irons in the mini-series. He is a middle class man from London drawn into the rarified world of the British upper class after he befriends the charismatic, but troubled Sebastian Marchmain (Ben Whishaw). At Brideshead, the luxurious Marchmain family estate, Ryder meets Sebastian’s younger sister, the beautiful Julia and his domineering mother (Emma Thompson), and his life is changed forever. Over the next decade Ryder learns first hand about the poison that lies beneath the prim and proper façade of the British upper crust as he, Sebastian and Julia try to bridge the deep rooted spiritual and social traditions that divide them and complicate their lives.
The new movie, ten hours shorter than the mini-series, compresses the 368 page novel into a tidy 135 minute film which plays fast and loose with the source material. Fans of the book will be pleased to know that Aloysius the teddy bear makes an appearance, and the ideas about repression, aristocracy and religion remain in place but may be less happy with other liberties taken by the filmmakers. Compressing the novel into feature length forced some changes to the time line of the story as presented in the book, but the core of the book remains untouched.
Handsomely translated for the screen—the film was shot at the grand Howard Castle, also the location of the mini series—the cinematography is lush, the period clothes suitably glamorous, the sets beautiful. More than just a Masterpiece Theatre treat for the eyes, the new Brideshead is wonderfully performed by a troupe comprised of British newcomers and old pros.
Goode plays Ryder as a low key, but unfailingly polite social climber with a conscience. Once he enters the gates of Brideshead he knows that he will never again be happy unless he is embraced by those who live within. The tragedy of his life is that while the upper crust inhabitants may love him, he will never truly be one of them. Goode slowly allows the complexity of his character to surface as he is drawn back to Brideshead year after year in his search or meaning in his life.
As Sebastian, the spoiled British eccentric—at one point he sends a telegram to Ryder saying he is near death, when in fact he only “broke a bone in his foot so small it doesn’t even have a name”—Ben Whishaw appears so fragile, both physically and emotionally, that the the weight of his responsibilities to his family and his religion seem ready to break him in half.
Hayley Atwell’s take on love interest Julia is dignified and yet sultry, but it is Emma Thompson as the formidable Lady Marchmain who dominates the screen. Hers is a supporting role with a relatively small amount of screen time, but Thompson makes the most of her scenes and walks away with the picture. With her starched delivery and arched eyebrows lines like, “Mr. Ryder, what form do your pleasures take?” or “Vulgar is not the same as funny,” become the verbal equivalent of a slap across the face.
Brideshead Revisited is sourced from material that is more than sixty years old and features spats, snoods and Model Ts but its themes of religious fundamentalism, pursuit of individualism and happiness, sexual tolerance and class are as current as anything on screens at your local multi-plex.
“Leap Year”, a new opposites-attract-romantic-comedy, stars Amy Adams and Matthew Goode as the metaphoric oil and water. She’s a perfectionist, he isn’t. She pushy, he’s laid back. She doesn’t do quaint very well, he’s… well, quaint. It’s the standard rom com set up, but instead of the usual New York setting director Anand Tucker places the action in the picturesque Irish country side.
