Tomorrowland

First Hit:  Interesting scope, parts that excelled, but overall this movie fails to deliver an engaging film from beginning to end.

The film’s early opening scenes included Casey, a truly curious smart girl (Britt Robertson), trying to hamper a rocket’s launch thereby keeping her engineer father employed. It also included Frank Walker (Young Frank played by Thomas Robinson and older Frank played by George Clooney) telling the story through two sets of eyes, the young curious smart boy and the wise old man who’s given up hope.

These three characters are pulled together by Athena (Raffey Cassidy); a robot created from the future whose mission is to find hope in the human race and give them the clue to the possibilities by giving out Tomorrowland pins.

The point of the film finally comes towards the end, when Nix (Hugh Laurie) gives a speech about how humans don’t care enough to fix the problems they are facing. The lavish way this film is presented is wonderful and engaging. The movie felt long which isn’t good and at 130 minutes, it was long.

Robertson was good and I felt that she did a great job of embodying her role. Robinson was cute and his early scenes were wonderful to watch. Clooney was good but there was something missing that kept me thinking “Clooney” and not about the role he was playing, Frank Walker. Cassidy was fantastic. I was fully engaged when she was on the screen, her way of being this robot was amazing. Laurie was a wonderful antagonist and his colloquy on the future was on target. Damon Lindelof and Brad Bird wrote a lengthy screenplay which is a commentary on how we are mortgaging our future and not paying attention to our self-created predicament. Bird did a great job of creating wonderful pictures of the now and the future, but it dragged on and could have used some snipping to tighten it up.

Overall:  A bit overblown, visually nice, but in the end not a very good film.

The Switch

First Hit: Although the ending is telegraphed it was watchable and, at times, funny.

Jennifer Aniston plays Kassie Larson a woman who has reached an age that is telling her, either she gets pregnant now or forgets about being a mother.

She’s had a number of relationships which didn’t work out including a brief dating stint with her best friend Wally Mars (played by Jason Bateman). It is obvious they like each other and get along well even though Wally is a cynical person who always pointing out what is wrong with something.

Kassie is hopeful and ends up in relationships that are not well thought out. I’m wondering if the tabloid Aniston was the inspiration for the character here. Anyway, she decides to find a sperm donor and tells Wally he’s not good looking enough to be the guy.

At a sperm donor inception party we meet Roland (played by Patrick Wilson) who is certainly good looking enough but dumber than a brick. This doesn’t fit because, in this film, Kassie is supposed to be a smart girl. A turn of events has Wally spilling Roland’s sperm so he replaces it with his own.

We’re supposed to believe he doesn’t remember it because of the drugs and alcohol he’s ingested but… This is about a low as this film gets and from here it is a long slow climb back to mediocrity.

Aniston, just seems to play the same type person much of the time. Because I’ve seen her much better in roles, I wish she’d stretch her talents. However, she is about the only thing (besides the kid) worth watching. Bateman plays a cynical sourpuss with little reason to be this way. At one point we get a glimpse of his history but not enough to make it real. Two lines of dialogue doesn’t make a history. Thomas Robinson and Bryce Robinson play their son Sebastian at different ages and they hold up their end of the story with solid acting talent. They are funny, smart and vulnerable and make it believable. Yet the funniest scene is between Bateman and Victor Pagan who plays a spontaneous street talker. I wonder if it would have been a better film had it been directed by one versus two directors (Josh Gordon and Will Speck).

Overall: Not much of a film, but Aniston does enough to keep people interested while I tired of Bateman.