Cinema Hype

April 1st is a big day for movie blogs. It’s almost expected: “Damon and Affleck sign on for Police Academy XIII!” and that kind of thing. (CH scrupulously avoided such tomfoolery, and by “scrupulously avoided” I mean “totally flaked.” And anyway, I’m a terrible liar, even in print or pixel or whatever it is we’re calling it.) The worst thing is, though, that sometimes real, honest-to-goodness casting news slips through on April 1st, only to be roundly mocked.

And so, in the spirit of the day, I give you a few announcements (past and present) that should have been April Fools Day jokes…but weren’t:

Travolta, Whitaker Bring Scientology’s Roots to Big Screen!

Ricci to Don Pig Nose for Penelope

…Someone (?) Makes Deaf Vampire Movie Entirely in ASL

Denise Richards Earns Fake Ph.D. for Bond Film

Michael Jackson to Make Film, Grab Crotch

Hulk Hogan to Ditch Sleeves on Santa’s Suit to Better Show Off Guns

And one more, opening this month:

Morgan Spurlock to Ditch McDonalds, Find Bin Laden

Here’s to April, folks.

April Fools Day, April Fool’s Day, April Fools’ Day

Happy holidays, CHers! I hope you’ve all been enjoying this festive time of year. We at CH headquarters have, which is obvious from the lack of postage. But hang on a little longer: we’ll be back after a New Year’s jaunt out of town. We’ve been watching plenty of movies. Promise. And oh, there will be Top 5s and Top 10s and silly casting news galore. Just sit tight! And have a happy New Year.

To keep things rolling, we’ll offer a special end-of-year Quotation Sensation. (Top-secret note to commenter Brydon: Your comment didn’t come through. Re-send, please!)

Here you go:

“What does this song mean? My whole life, I don’t know what this song means. I mean, ‘Should old acquaintance be forgot’? Does that mean that we should forget old acquaintances, or does it mean if we happened to forget them, we should remember them, which is not possible because we already forgot?”

Happy New Year!

Happy Thanksgiving, Cinema Hypers! What a great day: a dedicated holiday for food, family, friends, and dwelling a little on the good things in life. Not bad.

This Thanksgiving, I’d like to offer up a little gratitude to the deities of film. I spend a fair amount of time dissecting movies, pointing out the niggling little things that drive me crazy, offering reservations about movies that other people love. So here are a few things about Film and Film Things for which I am truly grateful:

1. Snappy dialogue
It’s amazing what good dialogue can do. It’s risky to say, but as far as I’m concerned, plot holes, unrecognizable characters, and a complete lack of action can be pretty easily ignored if there’s something fun to listen to. I’m talking witty comebacks, hairpin turns, and a little bit of human realism, preferably delivered at a good clip–what I once heard Lauren Graham (the queen of snappy dialogue at a good clip) refer to as “athletic dialogue.” Invented by the 1930s screwball comedies, but it never, ever gets old.

2. Sad comedies and funny dramas
When people ask about my favorite kind of movie, I always say, “The sad comedy. No. The funny drama. …You know what I mean?” The truth is that movies are meant to portray the reality of being human, even when they’re set in exotic places or unusual circumstances, or not even about humans, per se. And being human is neither pure comedy nor pure tragedy (one hopes). And so I am thankful for movies that get the balance right: The Royal Tenenbaums. Say Anything. Keeping the Faith. The Science of Sleep. Even when they’re weird, they’re still right.

3. George Clooney. I just am, okay? I like so much, in the words of Michael Scott, of what he chooses to be.

4. Serialization
Obviously, the film series as a genre is a risky move. After all, how many Police Academy movies are floating around in the ether? (Answer: six.) On the other hand, I’m thankful for serialized movies because they give everyone–writers, directors, characters, audiences–more time. Done right, they invite deeper and sometimes more responsible storytelling, since there is both the promise and the threat of connections to other films. Where would we be with only one Star Wars movie? Only Raiders of the Lost Ark? The Fellowship of the Ring? In a bad place, I tell you.

5. Musicals
Sure, not everybody’s into the whole “bursting into song” thing, but to those people I must say: Why not? Songs are fun. Dancing is awesome. Choreography is sometimes silly, but all the better for it, I say! I am a complete sucker for anything involving Gene Kelly and/or tap dancing, but it goes beyond that. Sometimes people have just got to sing, you know? And I, for one, will probably be singing right along (Shhh! Don’t tell!).

Happy Thanksgiving, all. Enjoy the day.

Thanksgiving, holidays, thankful, movies, movie series, musicals, George Clooney

Who knew John Wayne could pull off a tweed suit? We know his real name was Marion and that he lived a long and glamorous life in Los Angeles, but isn’t he the American Cowboy Extraordinaire? And yet, in 1951, right in the middle of a spate of Westerns, John Wayne surprised us–or at least the heads of studios all over Hollywood. He shed his Wranglers and neckerchief and headed off to Ireland to make a little romantic comedy, The Quiet Man, which should be on everybody’s St. Patrick’s Day viewing list.

The Quiet Man is an old, well-worn story: man returns to homeland and meets fiery local girl (Maureen O’Hara, the ultimate fiery local girl). There are wacky neighbors, a town crank, and plenty of community-spirit events. What this iteration does best, though, is that it keeps going long after most romantic comedies have ended with a fading screen and swelling music. The story doesn’t end when Sean Thornton and Mary-Kate Daneher fall in love; in fact, the meat of the movie takes place after the wedding. It’s a story about two strong personalities learning how to live and love together in a place where their business is everybody’s business. It’s a comedy with dramatic themes–starting a new life, loving concretely, sacrificing self–and though it clocks in at 129 minutes, it’s an easy movie to enjoy. A few parts come across as dubious where the treatment of women is concerned, but that’s both due to the characters (Mary-Kate doesn’t take an insult sitting down, we’ll say) and to the setting of the film–it shouldn’t be enough to make anybody skip the movie altogether.

It’s funny to see Wayne without his pistol and his cowboy persona, but he pulls it off, despite the distracting diction and mildly embarrassing horseback-riding posture. Wayne is a big performer–a big man with a big presence onscreen, even when he steps outside of his American Hero role. Thankfully, O’Hara refuses to fade into the background; she comes across as being his equal–a worthy match for someone with brains and spark.

In all, it’s a good movie, and something a little bit off the beaten path. If you’re looking to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day with someone other than Tom and Nicole, The Quiet Man is a good place to start.

St. Patrick’s Day, The Quiet Man, John Wayne, Maureen O’Hara, classic movies

Yesterday we at CH covered movies to make your blood turn to syrup, but there’s just no way to keep that up. Today it’s time for the other side of the coin: movies to prove, once and for all, how great it is to be single:

War of the Roses: Your marriage is falling apart; may as well throw a custody battle for the house into the mix, right? The granddaddy of all unromantic movies, apparently.

Closer: A painstaking, unflinching look at infidelity among two couples. Depressing, but good.

Eraserhead: David Lynch circa 1977; love as horror film. Bonus points to anyone who can get through it without nightmares (alien baby alert!).

Fatal Attraction: Note to self: keep pets away from Glenn Close. Ew.

American Beauty: Failing marriages, an unhealthy fixation on Mena Suvari, videos of plastic bags; just the thing to make sole control of the remote look suddenly attractive.

Unfaithful: Things here just…don’t end well. Trust me.

Heathers: Pine- and sap-free, guaranteed. “What’s your damage, Heather?”

Don’t we all feel a little bit better? Or is that a little bit bitter? Happy Valentine’s week from CHHQ. Or not. Whatever you prefer.

Valentine’s Day, unromantic movies

Speaking as a single woman, it seems that there are really two ways to approach Valentine’s Day. Either it’s the Scourge of Winter and must be avoided at all costs, or it’s something to be embraced to the point of forgetting there’s supposed to be a guy around in the first place. Bring on the chocolate! Pass the wine! Are those some dangly heart earrings I see? Excellent.

In the somewhat ambivalent spirit of the upcoming holiday, we at CH would like to present a two-post series on the films of Valentine’s Day and the films of those who would rather give February 14 over to someone else, say…Haters International. Whatever. Today we’ll be exploring a week’s worth of the sappiest, tear-jerkiest, eye-rollingest movies out there–we’re talking the romances that would make any Harlequin writer say, “Girl? Please.”

Without further ado:

An Affair to Remember: Cliched, but there it is. Any movie that other movies hold up as the Gold Standard of Sap must clearly be on the list. Plus, “her shriveled little legs!”

Return to Me: Super-sweet, but also kind of great. Bonus: directed by Bonnie Hunt, who knows a funny joke when she sees it.

Wild Hearts Can’t Be Broken: Mostly loved by horsey little girls and post-Jake Ryan Michael Schoeffling fans in the 80s. ‘Nuff said.

Garden State: Supposedly hip and charming, but the ending gives me hives. It’s like bathing in maple syrup.

Ghost: Before Meredith on The Office defiled it, this one was the romance movie of the 80s. Love from beyond the grave! Clearly sweet and…not…creepy? Ho-kay.

The Notebook: The CH staff must admit that someone around HQ hasn’t seen this one, but Googling “sappiest movie” yielded so many Notebook hits that it made the list, fair and square.

Somewhere in Time: How can a Jane Seymour/Christopher Reeve time-travel movie not instantly raise the old insulin level?

Tune in next time for anti-Valentiners and the movies they love!

movies, Valentine’s Day, romantic movies

What happened, exactly, to Bill Murray? Did he just get older? Did he experience some mental shift? Did he consciously decide to change his whole brand of comedy? He’s taken on a different persona, traded the slapstick for the understated, become a quiet comedian, and ventured into unexplored territories of facial hair. The shift is mostly a twenty-first-century phenomenon; sometime after Charlie’s Angels and before The Royal Tenenbaums, he made a shift. Groundhog Day, it seems, is something of a “bridge” movie: chronologically, we see an early-90s film. From a thematic perspective, though, we’ve got an early showcase for the Bill Murray of the 00s.

It’s not that nothing in Groundhog Day is silly or physical–the cold-shower scene is pretty over-the-top, and there are certainly funny faces involved here–it’s just that Murray becomes so stoic as he lives the same day over and over again. He deadpans his way through his weatherman scenes, several expository monologues, multiple suicide attempts, and one ridiculous groundhog-napping. It feels like he’s working on his shtick, here, staying totally calm in increasingly frantic circumstances. He’s looking ahead. He’s previewing the new millennium, no?

People who don’t like Groundhog Day usually make the same complaint: they don’t like seeing the same scenes over and over again (thirty-three times, if Wikipedia is to be believed). The repetition doesn’t interrupt the rhythm of the movie, though; instead, it sets the tempo. It’s a movie of short scenes repeated in quick succession, but arranged in such a way that we see the arcs of Phil’s experience: he’s afraid; he’s thrilled; he’s shrewd; he’s increasingly discontented; he’s striving to get it right. Technically, there’s repetition, but it’s not boring: there are changes in mood, small changes in dialogue as Phil refines his personal script, complete changes of intent. The character changes, even if the lines don’t, and that’s what separates “thematic choice” from “broken record.”

The humor in Groundhog Day is sort of like Murray himself: the truth is, both Good Phil and Bad Phil–or Noisy Bill and Quiet Bill–are fun. For having the sappy romantic-comedy ending that it does, the rest of the movie is remarkably and wonderfully snarky. Phil judges the people in Punxsutawney, but that doesn’t mean they weren’t mockable in the first place, and the movie acknowledges that. Bad Phil is fun to watch–he’s mean, but he’s not stupid, and he’s not not funny.

Alternatively, the aforementioned romantic-comedy ending is almost too much, but then there’s the implication that just “getting the girl” hasn’t been enough: when Phil uses his situation to seduce Rita (Andie MacDowell), he fails. When he uses his situation to become a good person in general, he succeeds in winning Rita and he gets to move on with his life. The movie ends up being more about wholeness and un-self-centeredness than anything else; Rita is just a symbol of that (being whole and un-self-centered herself, of course). It’s here that things go into dangerously sugary territory, but, with a little doubt-benefiting, things work out. The ending scene–in the front yard of the B&B–is so over-the-top sweet that we can only assume director Harold Ramis saw the sugar-shock potential and decided to embrace it; it becomes part of the hyperbole of the movie, sort of. It works, in a goofy, “I hope that was on purpose” kind of way. And anyway, Phil’s so happy to see February 3 that it’s hard to hold it against him, isn’t it?

Happy Groundhog Day to all! See you…tomorrow?

I hope all of you CH readers had lovely Christmases, if you’re of the Christmasing persuasion; things at CH Parental Headquarters were generally delightful, what with all of the Scrabble and the hanging around in pajamas and the opening of gifts.

In other news, I finally finished It’s a Wonderful Life, just in time. I now believe that I had never seen the whole thing–somehow I always seemed to arrive just as George crashed the car, and then wondered why nothing made sense. Now I know: Donna Reed and “Buffalo Girl;” planning to see the world and then staying in Bedford Falls; lending people money when they don’t deserve it; disappointment and disillusionment. Now that I’ve seen the whole thing, I see why people cry at the ending: it’s such a sad story and such a desperately happy ending, and it’s hard to be very snarky about it at all.

Thus endeth the Most Wonderful Time Film Festival; I might sit down with either The Family Stone or the original Miracle on 34th Street–both are still sitting next to the DVD player–but any further Christmas-movie viewing will be strictly for extra credit.

Merry and Happy to all! Now back to your regularly scheduled programming.

Christmas movies, It’s a Wonderful Life

I know you’re probably wondering what happened to the Most Wonderful Time Film Festival. I had this huge list of Christmas movies I was going to plow through. I still do. So what happened? It’s a Wonderful Life happened. George and Mary and Clarence and Zuzu happened, and so did disillusionment and redemption (I hear) and Frank Capra’s utter inability to cut anything, ever.

How is it that people watch this movie straight through? I’m not saying it’s bad. It’s not. I’m enjoying it. But the story of George Bailey’s life is long. I’ve been watching it all week, trying to finish–it’s like a giant bowl of pasta, where you feel like you’ve been eating and eating and eating, and you still have half the bowl left to go.

So that’s where the film festival stands: there’s a stack of borrowed movies in my living room and one behemoth American classic holding them all up (in the figurative sense). With a little luck and a little persistence, there will be more Christmas movies before the holiday ends.

Until then, I’ll be on the couch.

I apologize to all who were waiting on this week’s Thursday haiku (and I know there were many, many people waiting…right?); a minor act of God, also known as a cranky internet connection, kept me poetry-free. But. Getting on with it:

Trying to finish
It’s A Wonderful Life soon;
things look dubious.

I have a request to make. It’s nothing, really. Just…the next time I pray for guidance, can Cary Grant come to visit? He doesn’t really even have to do anything, per se–I’m not sure he’d have much to say about my life–but I’m sure that having him just stand around and look debonair would be quite helpful.

What I just described is essentially the plot of the 1947 movie The Bishop’s Wife: a workholic bishop (David Niven) and his beautiful wife (Loretta Young, assisted by her spectacular cheekbones) pray for guidance about building a cathedral and about their marriage, and Grant shows up in the form of an angel named Dudley. It’s a good movie, but it sometimes feels like it’s missing something, like somebody forgot to decide what’s really going on in the script. There are questions left unanswered: Is it a drama or a comedy? What’s the deal with the random ice skating? And, most importantly, what really happens between Dudley and Julia?

The structure of the Dudley/Julia relationship (and therefore the movie) is strange from a romantic comedy standpoint. Usually, a woman either ditches her stodgy old flame for the new man who truly understands her OR she tests the waters with a dashing newcomer but later realizes that the original lover was the better choice. Here, Julia connects with the dashing newcomer…and then she stays with the stodgy old flame, even though he’s still the less appealing of the two men. It’s a point of ambivalence for the audience: we realize that Julia should and will stay with the bishop, but it’s so much easier to root for Dudley, even if it’s inappropriate (and he’s a heavenly being, which I’m trying to ignore).

Furthermore, the script addresses the fact that the bishop and the townspeople are scandalized by the friendship, but nobody seems to think that the audience might agree. There’s the feeling that somebody should say something, or that either Julia or Dudley needs to acknowledge that maybe the bishop has reason to be upset, but the movie generally glosses over those concerns. Toward the end, it’s finally implied that Dudley may have fallen in love with Julia, but the ninety minutes before that are a vaguely unsettling series of flirtations, situations that anybody who’s ever been in a relationship would recognize as inappropriate. The movie might make more sense if it didn’t require us to believe in the ignorance of the main characters, or if it addressed the awkwardness and worked through it.

Aside from the strange dynamics between Dudley, Julia, and the bishop, The Bishop’s Wife is a solid holiday classic: nothing fancy, but there is plenty of snow and talk of Santa and the obligatory un-Scrooging of a main character, and that’s kind of the point.

The upshot: A decent, old-fashioned Christmas movie; worth seeing if you can ignore the elephant in the room.

Christmas wonder, joy of the season, blah blah blah. What I learned from Elf is that I totally want to go on a date with Will Ferrell. It’s a little weird, I know, especially if he’s wearing the tights and pointy shoes. (Maybe some people go for that; I don’t.) But judging from his first outing with Jovie (Zooey Deschanel), he’s not the type to sit in a cafe and make boring small talk. I’m just saying.

Anyway, the movie. The point of Elf isn’t the script, or even the characters, really. It’s all sort of basic holiday family movie fare: Scrooge-y businessman changes forever after run-in with excruciatingly cheerful/naive main character, etc., etc. The point of Elf is Ferrell. The best thing–or the most notable thing, anyway–about Ferrell as an actor is that he’s not afraid. He embraces whatever he’s doing. He commits. Sometimes (ahem…Anchorman), it’s enough to make a girl turn off the TV, but in Elf, it’s just funny. Endearing, even. Buddy the “Elf” is a sweetheart, and Ferrell makes it work by being utterly, steadfastly sincere. And that is what Elf is really about. Isn’t it?

I was on the ABC Family website this afternoon researching my lineup for the Most Wonderful Time Film Festival–turns out they’re showing “Christmas” “movies” as opposed to Christmas movies–when I saw this poll: Who’s Your Favorite Holiday Hero? Note the choices: a) Santa Claus b) Harry Potter c) Rudolph.

What?

Since when is Harry Potter a holiday hero? Yes, Hogwarts students do recognize Christmas as a legitimate holiday, and yes, Harry receives a sweater from Mrs. Weasley every year, but…that’s it. That’s the extent of Christmas in Harry Potter. One chapter or scene does not a holiday hero make.

Next you’ll be trying to tell me that The Sound of Music and The Wizard of Oz are holiday movies.

Oh, wait.

I’ve been putting off writing about White Christmas since Saturday night. I watched it with my whole attention. I enjoyed it. That’s the issue, actually: I may have enjoyed it too much to critique it. I just love it so much.

There, I said it. I love White Christmas. A lot. A lot, a lot. It’s just so funny, and then Danny Kaye and Vera Ellen start dancing, and The Bing and Rosemary Clooney start singing, and they love him, they love him, especially when he keeps them on the ball, and….this is what happens. I go all gooey as soon as they start singing about snow, and I can’t get it together until after the goofy little ballerina girls tip-toe their way around the giant tree at the end. It’s just so good: so sweet, so sharp, so much fun.

That’s all. Watch White Christmas, if you’ve never seen it. Watch it even if you have seen it. Simple, classic, charming. Perfect for a Saturday night writing Christmas cards or just curling up with some popcorn.

There are plenty of reasons that The Nativity Story shouldn’t be that good. The script is a little stilted. The production values come across as just a little bit 70s-BBC. Even some of the Biblical source material is missing (i.e. Ummm…heavenly host?). Somehow, though, it all comes together as an absorbing, thoughtful film.

What carries The Nativity Story is…well, the story. In all of the tellings and re-tellings and re-re-tellings, it’s easy to forget Mary and Joseph as living, breathing, interacting people. They get stuck in the relative shortness of what the Bible tells us about them. The movie strives to offer us a fuller picture: Director Catherine Hardwicke gives plenty of weight to the socio-political backdrop and then delves into the meat of the story, the relationships and conflicts that sometimes get lost in the telling. It turns out that the things Mary and her loved ones (I’ve always loved the term “Holy family”) go through are harrowing and heartbreaking: legal and religious issues, social rejection, several long journeys (with a very cute donkey, but that’s neither here nor there), and an absolutely corrupt king, among other things. The character of Joseph gets an especially close inspection, and emerges as a complex but likeable person. Hardwicke seems to relish telling the story of Mary and Joseph as a tale of lovers in a dangerous time as well as a piece of religious history.

The other reason The Nativity Story succeeds is because of the actors involved. A lot of people have high hopes for Keisha Castle-Hughes after her Academy-award-nominated performance in Whale Rider. She does well here, considering what she’s given. The role of Mary is a difficult one, mostly because there’s so much expectation and so little to do: there are long stretches where the script notes clearly call for “silent awe,” which is understandable but a little awkward. When Castle-Hughes gets actual dialogue, though, she’s charming and displays strong chemistry with her fellow actors. Her scenes with Elizabeth (Shohreh Aghdashloo) and Joseph (Oscar Isaac) are a relief after all of the beatific gazing. As far as Joseph is concerned, I’m not sure where Hardwicke found Isaac–he’s essentially a newcomer–but he’s outstanding: honorable and soulful, upstanding and approachable, all at the same time. It’s no wonder that Mary’s head over heels for him by the end of the movie. Everyone else sure is.

The Nativity Story isn’t perfect. The Hebrew accents feel a little silly, the angel Gabriel is vaguely creepy (though his hawk avatar is a nice touch), the wise man are obnoxious, and it occasionally comes across as a bit of a high-budget church pageant, among other things. There’s also the matter of the mysteriously missing heavenly host. But the whole here is better than the sum of its parts, and if you’re looking for a Christmas movie without Christmas lights or Danny DeVito, this is a perfectly good way to go.