To Rome With Love

First Hit:  Mediocre Allen film with some funny moments.

Over the last few years Woody Allen has created a few wonderful works based in Europe: “Midnight in Paris”, “Vicky Cristina Barcelona”, and “Match Point”.

Part of what made these films work is that Allen isn’t a character in them. It appears to me that his best work, these days, is when he isn’t a character in his films but when his focus is strong writing and directing.

Here Jerry (Allen) and his wife Phyllis (played by Judy Davis) are in Rome to meet their daughter Hayley’s (played by Alison Pill) fiancé Michelangelo (played by Flavio Parenti). In another story, John (played by Alex Baldwin) is coaching Jack (Jesse Eisenberg) about whether he should or will have sex with his live-in girlfriend Sally’s (played by Greta Gerwig) close friend Monica (Ellen Page) who is visiting them from Hollywood.

In another story, Millie and Antonio (played by Alessandra Mastronardi and Alessandro Tiberi respectively) are on their honeymoon in Rome and she wants to have an affair with an Italian film star while her new husband is attempting to fend off Anna (played by Penelope Cruz) a whore who’s been fully paid for.

Lastly, there is a story about the fleetingness and stupidity of fame with Leopoldo (played by Roberto Benigni) who all of a sudden finds himself the darling of the media until one day it stops, just as it started, suddenly and without reason.

Of the four major stories, the one with Jerry attempting to get Michelangelo’s father Giancarlo (played by Fabio Armiliato) to sing opera on stage after Jerry hears him singing opera in the shower are the funny bits. We discover that Giancarlo can only sing well when he is in a shower, so Jerry stages major operas with every scene with Giancarlo singing on stage in a portable shower.

Allen is mediocre and, for the most part, probably needs to quit being in front of the camera. Davis is good as Allen’s wife who puts up with her husband’s predilections. Pill is OK as Allen and Davis’ daughter. Parenti is a level above as the protective left wing fiancé. Baldwin is nothing interesting except when he says lines which reflect his real world woes. Eisenberg has no wings here and is retrained. Gerwig is OK but doesn’t seem engaged in the role. Page is supposed to be the femme fatale, but I found it hard to see her as described (sexy). Mastronardi and Tiberi are fine as the distracted honeymooners. Cruz came across as overtly trying. Benigni is somewhat mindless in this misplaced character. Armiliato was the best thing in the film. Being able to hold together a shower signing opera man was very good. Allen wrote and directed this very mediocre film.

Overall: This film was mostly lifeless and without a strong story – just a mash of four poorly constructed ones.

Your Sister's Sister

First Hit:  Not a great film and some situations were well acted and thoughtful.

The film begins with some speeches at a party in a living room about someone who’s been deceased for a year. The persons brother Jack (played by Mark Duplass), still hurting from the loss of his brother, gives a talk about some of the earlier and darker sides of his deceased brother.

The gathered group doesn’t want to hear it, including Iris (played by Emily Blunt) who was the girlfriend of the dead brother. She pulls Jack aside and suggests he get himself together by staying at her family’s cabin on an island in the Puget Sound. He gets on his bike and rides to a ferry, takes the ferry to an island and finds the remote island cabin. Arriving he runs into Iris’s gay sister Hannah (played by Rosemarie DeWitt).

Hannah is at the cabin because she just ended a 7-year relationship and is trying to find herself. They sit down, have a bunch of drinks and end up having sex. Iris arrives the next day to visit Jack unexpectedly and finds her sister there as well.

The untold stories begin to evolve here and the audience is along for the ride. What I liked was the process of how the sisters resolve their issue - it wasn't with a simple “I’m sorry”. There are long walks, moments of ignoring the other person in the room, and alone time. Jack has his own searching to do but his search comes to fruition when he trashes his bike.

It is within these sections of the film where I thought and felt the congruency of the remote scenery and emotional processing each person goes through to resolve what life brings.

Overall, Duplass is good but not great. There are interesting moments when we get a glimpse of an interesting character. Blunt is very good in her role and I enjoy when she is on the screen. She has an ability to hide and expose who she and her character are simultaneously. DeWitt is charming and her interaction with Blunt in the bed scenes are revealing, sweet and joyous to watch. Lynn Shelton wrote and directed this film which is very much a woman’s film with a woman’s point of view.

Overall: I fully enjoyed how the threesome under the direction of Shelton took their time to resolve the issue at hand.

Seeking a Friend for the End of the World

First Hit:  I liked this film although there were pieces missing.

The world is coming to an end by an asteroid that is going to hit the earth in 21 days. As Dodge (played by Steve Carell) and his wife listen to the news parked in their car, he is solemn, quite, within himself.

His wife, without saying a word, opens the car door and runs away from him. This set up lets us know that he’s not been close with his wife and they probably didn’t communicate at all. He goes home, tries to get his housekeeper to quit because of the end of the world status, but she doesn’t want to.

This is the running joke in the film. He meets up with his young neighbor Penny (played by Keira Knightley) who is crying on his fire escape because her boyfriend is leaving and she has missed the last plane available to fly home to see her family in England.

They become friends. Riots start erupting in their city so they leave in her car. He promises that he knows someone with a plane and will guide her there if she will take him to his long lost high-school love. She wants to see her family before the world’s demise and he thinks he can find love again.

Dodge is a very dour character. He has little life in him and in some cases his part feels forced. However, Penny’s character is full of emotion, juxtapositions and oddities like being able to sleep through anything.

The film doesn’t tie together all the pieces very well but it was Penny’s part that kept me engaged with the story.

Carell came across as required in his character – meaning I couldn’t feel him being the character he was playing. He was close at times, but not enough. Knightley was far more moving and interesting in her role. Martin Sheen in a small part, as Dodge’s father, was excellent. Lorene Scafaria wrote and directed this film. I’m not sure whether it was poor direction or poor acting on Carell’s part that made the film seem like it wasn’t firing on all cylinders.

Overall:  I thoroughly enjoyed moments in this film but at other times it seem overly controlled.

Magic Mike

First Hit:  The girls in the audience (both in the film and in my theater) really enjoyed these well sculpted males.

This story was somewhat unique in that male exotic dancers are rarely the subject of a film.

Mike (played by Channing Tatum) is “an entrepreneur”. He is a roofer, he does odd jobs, he’s a male exotic dancer, and his love is furniture making. He does everything well and he cares. As a dancer he is phenomenal. His moves are like “magic”.

He works in a club owned by Dallas (played by Matthew McConaughey). Dallas is in-charge and it is evident. He’s also great at making his dancers feel good about working in his club while he enriches himself. He’s got a dark side but it is rarely evident.

Adam (played by Alex Pettyfer) is a lazy lost young man who won’t wear a tie for a job, but really finds something wrong with every job he thinks about. He lives with his sister Brooke (played by Cody Horn) who has a steady job in medical insurance and is very protective of her younger brother. One day Mike takes Adam to Dallas’ club. He’s thrown on stage and lo-and-behold, he has found something he can do and he makes money – easy cash.

Brooke asks Mike to take care of her young brother although she disapproves of Adam and Mike’s chosen field of work. Mike has an occasional, on-call girlfriend named Joanna (played by Olivia Munn) who does three-ways with him, is a psychologist, and is very seductive. She appears in the film in an on-call basis until her truth becomes known to Mike.

The film isn’t about the dancing, which is some cases extraordinary, it is about growing up and living one’s truth.

Tatum is strong and wonderful in his portrayal of a man who really wants to find a different life, but shows enough internal roadblocks to make mistakes in judgment. McConaughey is perfect as the somewhat sleazy male dancer night club owner. Pettyfer is good as the lost young man but there isn’t enough understanding as to why he’s so dead set against doing various jobs (where was his pain?). Munn is very good as a woman who lives two lives and likes to play with Mike. Horn is a revelation. I really liked her look and feel as her character. She felt real in her role. Reid Carolin wrote a very strong script. Steven Soderbergh delivered yet another excellent film. The direction was clear, strong, and crisp – no wasted scenes.

Overall: This was a very entertaining film as the girls in the audience vocally reminded me.

Take this Waltz

First Hit:  Somewhat disquieting characters lacking direct communication where communication requirements reign.

We are introduced to Margo (played by Michelle Williams) in her fear of being in-between things. She is struggling being in an airport and then on a plane – she is nowhere, she is in-between places.

Meeting Daniel (played by Luke Kirby) on the plane it is obvious there is a connection, they flirt, they land and Margo goes home to her husband Lou (played by Seth Rogen) who is a cookbook writer working on a book about cooking chicken.

Their relationship is safe for her but there are moments where you sense/feel their tension. The film is obvious in tension points between the couple and also because Daniel happens to live across the street from Margo and Lou.

This film is about being tugged by a longing of something within. Lou is completely focused on his cooking and they have parties to share what he is experimenting with. Margo is missing something within her relationship with Lou but loves the illusion of safety he brings with the life they have together.

Daniel is in love and wants to be with Margo but knows it will have to be on Margo’s terms. How do the actors portray this triangle story? For the most part, very well. Margo is the most complex character in the film as well as being the main character.

The standardization of the two men by having a safe man (Lou) and a more dangerous man (Daniel) be the points by which Margo is determining her course were well done. In the end the film, either with purpose or not, tries to keep the audience choosing whether Margo should stay with Lou or go to Daniel.

Williams does an outstanding job of creating questions in the male characters, the audience and herself. Kirby is solid as the interested third wheel. Rogen is OK as Williams husband, cook and solid home base. Sarah Silverman (playing Geraldine) does a very good job as an alcoholic relative. Sarah Polley wrote and directed this film. I was left with the sense that she didn’t know her main character nor did she want to which isn’t a bad thing.

Overall:  This film was interesting and uninteresting at the same time.