“Elemental,” the new Pixar picture now playing in theatres, takes an old-fashioned love story and gives it a high-concept spin.
The setting is Element City, a metropolis divided into four distinct districts, one for every kind of the city’s anthropomorphized element residents. The fire people live in the Fire Land, there’s the Splash District for water people, the Terra District for land people, and the Breeze District for air people.
“Elemental” focusses on the Lumen family and their fiery daughter Ember (voice of Leah Lewis) who immigrated to Element City looking for a better life. The young flame is poised to take over the family’s Fire Land shop, a small convenience store with the slogan “We Flame to Please!”
“This shop is the dream of our family,” says patriarch Bernie Lumen (voice of Ronnie Del Carmen). “Someday it’ll all be yours!” Eager to please her parents, Ember feigns excitement at the prospect of running the shop, the family’s pride and joy.
“I’ve been trying to fill my father’s shoes,” she says, “but I was never asked what I want to do.”
As her hidden resentment grows, Ember becomes sullen and begins lashing out until she meets
Water person Wade Ripple (voice of Mamoudou Athie), who, as a youngster, was once stuck inside a sponge. Despite that trauma, he grew up to be a kind, laid-back guy who cries at the drop of a hat.
Ember has always thought that “elements don’t mix,” but when Wade comes into her life she learns that sometimes opposites do attract and that she can make her own decisions. “Why does anyone get to tell you what you can do in your life?” asks Wade.
“Elemental” has a big heart, but not big enough to justify the film’s feature length. A new spin on the star-crossed lovers genre, à la “Romeo and Juliet,” it is a simple tale of the heart wanting what the heart wants despite differences. Then there’s the “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” vibe between Wade and Bernie, which is clever but never quite ignites.
The vivid artwork is often spectacular, and provides many beautiful images, but the watered-down story does not equal the film’s visual impact.
Director Peter Sohn, who also helmed “The Good Dinosaur,” builds a new world and introduces other story elements, including immigration metaphors, references to racism and intolerance, but these aspects often feel tentative, more well-intentioned than effective.
Better is the relationship between Ember and her father. Sohn used personal experience to shape the story of a father’s expectation and deference to tradition, and how the weight of that affects Ember. Their connection feels authentic and grounds the action of the rest of the film.
Opening the show in theatres is “Carl’s Date,” a sweet natured short film featuring Carl Fredricksen (voice of Ed Asner) and his adorable talking dog, Dug (voice of Bob Peterson) of the much-loved film “Up.” It’s a funny, tightly scripted look at companionship that made me think, by the time the main feature was over, that “Elemental,” given its slight narrative, might have had more punch, and seemed less stretched, as a short.
“Elemental” is wonderfully crafted, but the formulaic story prevents it from sitting on the shelf alongside other Pixar greats like “Up,” WALL-E” or “Toy Story.”
The idea of turning self-help books into movies isn’t new. Fifty years ago Helen Gurley Brown’s guidebook “Sex and the Single Girl,” which featured advice on “How to be Sexy,” among other useful tips, was made into a film starring Natalie Wood and “Mean Girls” was an adaptation of the high school survival manual “Queen Bees and Wannabes: Helping Your Daughters Survive Cliques, Gossip, Boyfriends, and Other Realities of Adolescence.”
So the idea of the 2012 farce “Think Like a Man” based on Steve Harvey’s best-selling book, “Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man,” wasn’t a stretch.
But now a sequel? The question is: How do you conjure a second story out of a book with no plot? Set it in Vegas and let Kevin Hart do all the heavy lifting.
The idea of Harvey’s tome is to give women an inside look into the workings of the male psyche and take control of their relationships. It’s typical battle of the sexes stuff and on film they play it for laughs.
The four couples from the original movie— Maya and Zeke (Meagan Good and Romany Malco), Dominic and Lauren (Michael Ealy and Taraji P. Henson), Jeremy and Kristen (Jerry Ferrara and Gabrielle Union) and Tish and Bennett (Wendi McLendon-Covey and Gary Owen)—plus the almost single Cedric (Kevin Hart) reunite in Las Vegas—“The number one destination in the world for people who do the craziest thing… get married.”—for “Think Like A Man Too.”
They’ve gathered for the wedding of Candace (Regina Hall) and Michael (Terrence Jenkins) but you know as soon as someone says, “I’m going to give you the perfect wedding… nothing is going to go wrong,” that, of course, everything is going to go wrong. The romantic getaway is jeopardized when the bachelorette and bachelor parties spin out of control.
“Think Like a Man Too” plays like a tamer version of “The Hangover.” There’s even a cameo from a world champion boxer but “TLAMT” doesn’t have the cynical edge of the Bradley Cooper movie. Instead, it plays it safe, making Sin City look like a wild but not terribly dangerous place to get married. All the usual Vegas clichés are well represented, from the gambling montage to the glaring neon lights to flaming cocktails to skimpy bikini-clad women to male strippers. What happens in Vegas also happens in the movies… quite often. The only thing missing is an Elvis impersonator or two.
Director Tim Story moves the story—what there is of it—along faster than a spinning roulette wheel. Montages and music video interludes keep the pace up, disguising the fact that there isn’t much going on. The story is thin, despite the multiple storylines crisscrossing throughout.
Kevin Hart seems to be trying to singlehandedly make up for a dearth of story by pulling out all the stops. No pratfall or face pull is beyond him. He even recreates Tom Cruise’s “Risky Business” underwear dance. His hyperactive performance stands in stark contrast to the more laid back work from his co-stars, but it does add a splash of life to every scene he’s in. Only his enthusiastic reading of a line like, “I’m sick of this non-tourage,” could pull laughs from some of this material.
“Think Like a Man Too” is a thin story bolstered by a few laughs (courtesy of Hart) and good-looking people navigating the choppy waters of modern romance. The advice contained within has more Hart than actual heart and is unlikely to provide much self-help, but has the same kind of bland appeal as its predecessor.
SYNOPSIS: Annie’s (Kristen Wiig) life is in tatters. Her business is a victim of a downturned economy and her boyfriend (Jon Hamm) calls her his “number three.” When BFF Lillian (Maya Rudolph) asks Annie to be her maid of honour she should be thrilled but is overwhelmed by the job and her pushy fellow bridesmaids (Rose Byrne, Melissa McCarthy, Wendi McLendon-Covey and Ellie Kemper) or as Lillian calls them, the “stone cold pack of weirdoes.”
Star rating
Richard: ****
Mark: ****
Richard Crouse: Mark, the big mistake people will make about Bridesmaids is thinking that it is a chick flick or a female version of The Hangover. In fact, I think it takes the best elements of those two and cleverly mixes them into one very funny but still very heartfelt movie that should have been called Bridesmaid on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown. Do you agree with me that this is the funniest female comedy that Tina Fey didn’t write?
Mark Breslin: I’ve been raving for years that Kristin Wiig is the Carol Burnett of our times: the greatest female sketch comic working today. Now, with this movie, she surpasses even that. I was worried that the movie would just substitute girl gross-outs for boy gross-outs, but there’s a depth here that the trailer doesn’t hint at. The humour is based on some pretty dark topics: fear of failure, loneliness, body image issues, so bravo to Wiig and her cast for going there. But most importantly, Wiig has wrested the wedding comedy from the hands of Kate Hudson.
RC: Hallelujah! Wiig is the best thing to happen to SNL in years but her big screen output has been somewhat underwhelming. Her movies like MacGruber always felt to me like she was acting in a long form sketch. She’s always funny, but I never felt like there was a real depth of character there until now. Her work as the neurotic but mostly well meaning Annie is a breakthrough, proving that being funny and having feelings are not mutually exclusive.
MB: Well put, Richard. But before we turn off any potential moviegoer thinking they’re about to watch a Sundance comedy, let’s remember that there are two hysterical, verrrrry broad set pieces in the middle of the movie that will satisfy anyone – male or female looking for belly laughs. The only thing in the movie that didn’t work for me were the British roommates, which felt forced, unlike her romance with the patrolman, which felt real and blithe. He’s a standout in a large cast. Anybody in it catch your eye?
RC: Absolutely. Chris O’Dowd as the lovelorn cop brings a huge amount of charm to the movie and Rose Byrne, who I’m used to seeing in dramas, is very funny.
MB: Let’s not forget Melissa McCarthy who gets huge laughs, even if some of them are on the cheap side. And Jill Clayburgh in her last role. R.I.P.
The big mistake people will make about “Bridesmaids,” a new comedy starring an ensemble of female comedians headed by Kristen Wiig, is that it is a chick flick or a female version of “The Hangover.” It has elements of both, but is closer in spirit to “Knocked Up” or “The Forty Year Old Virgin;” heartfelt comedies that place the characters first and the laughs second.
When we first meet Annie (Kristen Wiig, who also co-wrote the script), her life is in tatters. Her business is a victim of a downturned economy and her boyfriend (Jon Hamm) calls her his “number three.” When her best friend Lillian (Maya Rudolph) asks Annie to be her maid of honor she should be thrilled but is overwhelmed by the job and her fellow bridesmaids (Rose Byrne, Melissa McCarthy, Wendi McLendon-Covey and Ellie Kemper) or as Lillian calls them, the “stone cold pack of weirdoes.”
Kristen Wiig was the best thing to happen to “Saturday Night Live” in years but her big screen output has been somewhat underwhelming. In movies like “MacGruber” and “Paul” it always felt to me like she was simply acting in a long form sketch. She’s always funny, but I never felt like there was a real depth of character there. Until “Bridesmaids” that is. Her work as the neurotic but mostly well meaning Annie is a breakthrough, proving that being funny and having feelings are not mutually exclusive.
The rest of the cast impresses as well. Like Wiig, Rudolph has both the comedic and dramatic chops to make us laugh and care about the characters, and Rose Byrne steps outside of the dramas we’re used to seeing her in to deliver a subdued but very funny performance. Irish actor Chris O’Dowd, virtually the only male actor to utter a line apart from Jon Hamm in a raunchy cameo, brings an enormous amount of charm to the role of Rhodes, the lovelorn cop. There’s good chemistry all round, a key element that prevents the story from veering into rom com territory.
So far I’ve talked about “feelings” and used words like “heartfelt” to describe “Bridesmaids,” but don’t get me wrong, this is still a wild comedy. It doesn’t out-raunch the “Hangover” guys, but there are bodily function jokes a plenty, one very funny sex scene and language that would make a teamster blush. The girls can throw it down with the guys, but somehow it’s not as gross. Much of it is still gross, just not as gross.
“Bridesmaids” is the funniest movie so far this year and should appeal to everyone, not just women.
