Brave - 2 smiles

When a movie carries the Pixar brand, the expectations are high, very high. So it’s unfortunate that “Brave,” Pixar’s latest about an unconventional fairytale princess having mother issues in medieval Scotland, doesn’t measure up. Technically and visually, “Brave” is up to Pixar’s standards. The curly red hair of the heroine is rendered with a naturalness that’s distracting. But in terms of story and emotional impact, this movie comes up short. If you loved WALL-E, Up and Toy Story 3, with their ability to be simple yet profound, you’ll be disappointed here. Merida (voiced by Kelly Macdonald) is supposed to be the heroine, but the narrative tilts the balance too far in Mom’s direction so instead of being adorably spunky, Merida becomes more of a willful brat and it’s really hard to like her let alone root for her. Mom, Queen Elinor (voiced by Emma Thompson) is really the heroine. She is the most complex of the characters and the one that best exemplifies the film’s title.

Merida’s father, King Fergus (Billy Connolly) is a happy-go-lucky fellow who indulges his daughter, teaching her how to use a bow and allowing her to roam freely, doing what she wants. Her mother is prim and critical and would prefer that Merida spend her time in ladylike pursuits rather than practicing archery and galloping about on her horse, Angus. The situation comes to a head when Merida reaches adolescence and is expected to wed to maintain order among the potentially warring clans. Her husband is to be the son of one of three clan leaders and the sons will compete in an archery contest. When Merida enters the games herself and wins with her archery ability, her mother tries to punish her by throwing her bow into the fireplace. Merida rides off in a tempter and meets a slightly dotty witch (Julie Walters) who casts a spell to help change Elinor’s mind. However, the spell changes Elinor into a Mama Bear. Now mother and daughter need each other to try to find a way to break the spell. “Brave” isn’t a bad movie. It’s just not one of Pixar’s best. 6/22/12

Seeking a Friend for the End of the World - 2 1/2 smiles

“Seeking a Friend for the End of the World,” the directorial debut of screenwriter Lorene Scafaria, is all about the significance of love, companionship and family as we face the waning moments of our lives. Nearly everyone in the film deals with the end of the world in his/her own way and the first half of the film is more comedy with a lot of what-if scenarios. How long would people still go to their jobs? How long would the news broadcasts continue? When would the rioting start? When would it stop? Would people choose to live until the end?

The film opens with an Armageddon-style rescue mission failing. Dodge (Steve Carell) and his wife sit parked in their car, listening to a radio announcer reporting on the defeat of a shuttle mission to divert an asteroid currently on track to collide with the Earth. Dodge’s wife opens the car door and runs away, never to be seen again. Dodge’s friends Warren (Rob Corddry) and his wife Diane (Connie Britton) host a dinner party where Diane introduces Dodge to her desperate friend Karen so he won’t have to die alone. Dodge ends up fleeing the city with his downstairs neighbor Penny (Keira Knightley), who has just broken up with her slacker boyfriend (Adam Brody). Dodge wants to go find the one that got away and Penny wants to find a way to get back to England to see her family (all commercial air traffic has been grounded). Here the film begins to shift tone from comedy to serious drama. Nonetheless, the reason this movie works is Carell and Knightley. Carrell has a sad center to many of his comic characters and here he plays a man wrestling with the connections (and lack thereof) that he’s made and broken in his life and his performance is understated and polished. Knightley’s character, Penny, on the other hand, is more than just a free-spirited soul. She and Dodge poke at each other equally and their odd-couple routine is wins us over as we watch it develop first into friendship and then into love. “Seeking a Friend for the End of the World” is a touchingly sweet rom-com although it makes no promise of a happy ending. 6/26/12

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel - 3 1/2 smiles

Although “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel” is overly dramatic in places and fairly predictable, the exceptional cast makes the script seem new and different. The pros here include Bill Nighy, Maggie Smith, Tom Wilkinson and Judi Dench and it’s a pleasure to watch them work together. The newly widowed Evelyn (Dench), the recently retired Graham (Wilkinson), the long married Douglas (Nighy) and Jean (Penelope Wilton), the rich-husband-seeking Madge (Celia Imrie), the older-man-looking-for-romance Norman (Ronald Pickup) and the xenophobic Muriel (Maggie Smith) all have their reasons for moving to Jaipur, India. Some hoping for a new start, some seeking new/old loves, one seeking affordable hip surgery. And they all end up at the Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, which doesn’t quite match the brochure. But as the earnest proprietor Sonny (Dev Patel) tells them, ‘Everything will be all right in the end and if it’s not alright, then it’s not yet the end.’

Added to the various stories is a romance between Sonny and a colleague of Evelyn’s at the call center where she finds herself employed for the first time in her life. However, this seventh subplot, added perhaps to keep the story from being too white and too much about the elderly, feels wedged in and the tone and pacing change whenever the focus shifts to Sonny. Also, Muriel’s intolerant ways are so a part of her character (e.g. her body language and the clipped tone of her frequent insults) that her transformation from racist to accepting lover of all things Indian strains credibility given the time span of the story. Nonetheless, the skill of excellent cast keeps the lightweight script from falling into numbing fluff. And with John Madden directing, there’s a wonderful mix of story and travelogue that keeps the film a notch above. There are some brutal realities about the declining years, from loneliness to financial woes, that can’t be solved by a simple change of location, but “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel” doesn’t claim to solve life’s problems. It does, however, entertain. 5/11/12

The Last Ride - 2 smiles

“Last Ride” is a leisurely paced, moderately engaging road-trip movie that focuses on the developing relationship between the two central characters: country music great Hank Williams (persuasively played by Henry Thomas) and inexperienced, small-town boy, Silas (Jesse James), who’s hired as a driver for the ailing superstar during his final days of 1952. If you’re a Hank Williams fan, you’ll probably enjoy this movie more although Hank doesn’t sing nor does director Harry Thomason use his music in the soundtrack.

Silas (James) is hired to drive ‘Mr. Wells’ from Montgomery, Ala., to stops in West Virginia and Ohio and get him there sober. Silas doesn’t know who his passenger is nor is he equipped to see that Mr. Wells doesn’t drink. Thomas wisely underplays a part that could easily fall into parody. Ashen-faced, unsteady of step and given to violent bouts of coughing, he comes across as a battered wreck, looking much older than his 29 years. James might be young but he is more than adequate as the good-hearted foil who slowly gains William’s respect and friendship. However, the acting doesn’t out weight the weak story, which mainly takes place inside a blue Cadillac with two less than interesting characters = one who’s mostly drunk or getting there and the other with no back story and a perpetually worried expression. 6/6/12

Rock of Ages - 2 smiles

Sometimes converting a Broadway musical into a movie works (e.g., Hairspray) and sometimes it doesn’t. Unfortunately for “Rock of Ages,” it doesn’t work. The main problem is the bland leads. Julianne Hough is supposed to be the small-town girl who goes to Hollywood so her prettiness works for her character. However, Diego Boneta lacks the edginess his character needs to be ‘a city boy, born and raised in South Detroit’ and he and Hough have no real chemistry to make their romance even half-way interesting. The story is a worn-out retread, the music watered-down versions of the heavy metal bands from the 80s and the wigs everyone wears truly awful. The more interesting aspects of the movie involve the secondary characters, including Tom Cruise as a perpetually wasted rock god and Catherine Zeta-Jones as a politician’s wife crusading against rock music.

Sherrie (Hough) arrives in Los Angeles in hopes of finding stardom. Luckily Drew (Boneta) helps her after she has her suitcase stolen and introduces her to club owner Dennis Dupree (Alec Baldwin), who gives Sherrie a job as a waitress. Sherrie and Drew fall in love while all at the club await a historic gig by rock legend Stacee Jaxx (Cruise). Planning to lead a protest against that show is the mayor’s wife, the conniving Patricia Whitmore (Zeta Jones). It’s really not that interesting except when Cruise is on screen. He makes a good rock star – the preening strut, the hair whipping, the bare-chested leather outfits. And he can actually sing. Nonetheless, everything about “Rock of Ages” seems plastic and superficial. 6/15/12

To Rome With Love - 1 1/2 smiles

“To Rome With Love,” written and directed by Woody Allen, is a collection of skits loosely strung together in a cross-generational contemplation of issues that anyone familiar with Allen’s films will recognize. It has a been-there-seen-that feel that might initially benefit from the good will generated by last year’s Midnight in Paris, but word-of-mouth will ultimately affect the box office. Allen script isn’t coherent, his characters are less than interesting and the acting, even with a solid cast, is amateurish. Although the four stories intercut, they never connect and the passage of time is inconsistent. One couple’s story seems confined to a single day, while others appear to spin out across many weeks.

In one story, a young couple, accidentally separated, enjoys separate affairs; in another, an American opera director discovers a singer who can only perform in the shower. In the third, a young man finds himself falling for his girlfriend’s best friend; in the fourth, a minor bureaucrat wakes one day to find himself inexplicably famous. All have elements of improbability. In the third story, for example, the young man is advised by an older stranger who follows him around. Sometimes other characters see this fellow; other times, they don’t. Is he a projection of the young man’s worries? Is the young man a projection of the older man’s memories? Do we really care? And the casting seems odd. Jesse Eisenberg is boring as the young man studying abroad, but when his girlfriend reluctantly introduces him to her dangerously sexy best friend, and it turns out to be Ellen Page, you say, ‘Whoa! She’s the desirable temptress?’ Alec Baldwin comes off best as the jaded American who spends most of the film following Eisenberg’s character around, commenting on the melodrama of young love. If you’re really interested in seeing a Woody Allen movie, rent Midnight in Paris. Skip “To Rome With Love.” 6/24/12

Madagascar 3 - 3 smiles

“Madagascar 3,” the on-going adventures of Alex the lion (voiced by Ben Stiller), Marty the zebra (Chris Rock), Melman the giraffe (David Schwimmer) and Gloria the hippo (Jada Pinkett Smith), is full of wonderful lunacy and better than the first two. And creative, too. At one point, a talking penguin orders a chimpanzee to ‘deploy the banana gun.’ This order is intended to stop a Monte Carlo animal control officer, Captain Chantal Dubois (voiced by Frances McDormand doing a wonderfully silly French accent). And as the banana bullets come at her, she engages in a series of slo-mo ‘Matrix’-style bullet dodging that’s inspired. Pretty funny stuff.

As our heroes try to evade the tenacious Dubois, who wants Alex’s head for her trophy wall, they are forced to, literally, join the circus. The antics Vitaly (Bryan Cranston), a tiger who can jump through a tiny hoop, Gia (Jessica Chastain), a jaguar who longs to fly on the trapeze and Stefano (Martin Short), a the sea lion who wants to be a cannonball contribute to the visuals of the circus with some eye-popping neon sequences. But you know that Dubois is going to be lurking in the background just waiting to pounce. And, surprisingly, there’s an emotional core to the story with Vitaly, who has lost his confidence and King Julien’s (Sacha Baron Cohen) romance with the tricycle-riding bear named Sonya. And, of course, you have the loyalty and friendship of Alex, Marty, Melman and Gloria. Kids will love “Madagascar 3” and parents will, too. 6/15/12

Prometheus - 2 smiles

I was disappointed with “Prometheus,” director Ridley Scott’s supposed prequel to Alien. It is neither fast-moving action thriller nor a deep existential examination of the origins of humanity. This movie is hardly profound and aside from a handful of first-rate sequences, there are dull stretches mixed with the sudden appearance of ugly, sinister aliens. And everything is gloomy – the scenes in the space ship are dimly lit and the scenes on the alien planet are just as murky, where most of the action takes place in a cave, illuminated by flashlights. The positive for “Prometheus” involves Noomi Rapace, the Swedish actress best known for her performances in the Swedish version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo series. Much like Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley in Alien, Rapace plays a strong woman, especially in the sequence where she performs an emergency medical procedure. (I cringed throughout).

The quest in this movie is to find God. Dr. Shaw (Rapace) and her partner believe that they have located the specific point in the galaxy where the gods who founded civilization are located. They are seekers, keyed into the spiritual side of science, while Meredith Vickers (Charlize Theron), as the representative of the corporation funding the expedition, is more interested in money. When they arrive on the distant planet, Dr. Shaw and her team explore. They are accompanied by a very human-looking robot, played by an overly slender but excellent Michael Fassbender. His David is full of wit, subtlety and quiet menace.  For almost an hour, the story goes nowhere and takes it’s time getting there. The last 45 minutes are more lively when everything happens, including a needless twist at the end. Although the special effects are impressive, “Prometheus” is, nonetheless, disappointing.

Peace, Love and Misunderstanding - 2 1/2 smiles

“Peace, Love and Misunderstanding” is an enjoyable comedy if you don’t expect too much and don’t look too deeply at the plot. Jane Fonda has her juiciest part in years as Grace, an aging hippie, a free-loving sculptor, painter and pot dealer in Woodstock, NY.  Grace introduces weed to her grandchildren, Zoe (Elizabeth Olsen) and Jake (Nat Wolf) then tells them not to tell their mom, Diane (Catherine Keener), an uptight lawyer who has brought the kids to Woodstock to meet her long-estranged mother after her marriage implodes. Diane is still angry at Grace’s promiscuity while she was growing up and that Grace sold pot to Diane’s friends at Diane’s wedding. There are predictable mother-daughter clashes, but Grace helps Diane loosen up by fixing her up with a local carpenter/singer (Jeffrey Dean Morgan).

There isn’t anything we haven’t seen before in the script by first-timers Christina Mengert and Joseph Muszynski, including the documentary Jake is making with his camcorder and all of the hippie clichés (wind chimes, demonstrations for peace and an ancient VW bus). And Grace easily overcomes all of the problems Diane and the kids have. Nonetheless, everything works because of the excellent cast, guided by veteran director Bruce Beresford.  Keener adds depth and complexity to her tough, cynical character and Fonda, still beautiful, plays her character with enthusiasm tinged with a little self-parody.  “Peace, Love and Misunderstanding” is full of superficial fun, but not much more. 6/8/12

The Intouchables - 4 smiles

Already a huge hit in Europe, “The Intouchables” has warmth, humor and an understated sweetness that will catch you unawares. Written and directed by Eric Toledano and Olivier Nakache, it’s the factual story of an unconventional relationship between a wealthy quadriplegic from the ritziest neighborhood in Paris and his Senegalese caregiver from the ghetto. Their bond begins as a working one, but builds, through trust and care and shared experiences, into a lasting friendship that changes two unhappy lives. This is definitely a feel-good story and what makes it so entertaining is the powerfully appealing chemistry of odd couple Francois Cluzet (who looks like a French Dustin Hoffman) and Omar Sy (who won the French Oscar for this role last year), a strappingly handsome and charismatic actor.

The daily care (washing, changing, massaging, shaving, cleaning, spoon-feeding, lifting) of a paralyzed patient are so daunting that Philippe Pozzo di Borgo (played with heartbreaking honesty by Cluzet) is always interviewing new job applicants. Many apply, but there’s something intriguing, irritating and challenging about Driss (Sy) that rouses Philippe’s curiosity. The man’s rebellious spirit, irreverent attitude and lack of pity are refreshing. Driss hates the job at first, refusing to change Philippe’s diapers, insulting his taste in music and generally marking time until he can go back on welfare. Nonetheless, the two men overcome their differences and learn to help each other.  Driss exerts an influence that heals some of his boss’s emotional pain such as teaching Philippe how to smoke a joint while making him listen to Earth, Wind and Fire or acting as a makeshift therapist to Philippe’s neurotic teenage daughter. Or helping Philippe overcome his reluctance to schedule a face-to-face meeting with a woman he’s been writing to. Philippe, in turn, teaches his uneducated caregiver to appreciate Vivaldi and passes him off to the pretentious art world as an important new painter whose work is worthy of a pricey investment. Since Philippe was paralyzed from the neck down from a paragliding accident, you can’t help but feel the terror and the ultimate thrill of their friendship when they share a paragliding excursion. Driss learns compassion and responsibility while Philippe gains courage to take control of his own life. “The Intouchables” is a charming buddy comedy that you’re sure to enjoy. Be sure to see it. Subtitles. 6/3/12

Snow White and the Huntsman - 3 smiles

“Snow White and the Huntsman,” starring Charlize Theron, Kristen Stewart and Chris Hemsworth, is more related to the Brothers Grimm than Walt Disney.  The PG-13 rating should be a clear warning that little ones will find this Snow White too intense. But director Rupert Sanders does manage to impress with visuals that balance light and dark. Like the Dark Forest with its menacing trees that feed on the fears of its hapless victims. Or a gruesome troll awakened from his sleep only to be tamed by beauty’s smile. Or dawn in fairyland, when a blue-eyed sprite awakens from the belly of a dove and Snow White receives a blessing from a magnificent white stag. The story follows a familiar line with a few exceptions: there’s the huntsman (Hemsworth), who’s sent into the Dark Forest when Snow escapes from the castle just when Ravenna (Theron) discovers she must consume Snow’s heart to remain eternally young. And there’s the queen’s brother, Finn (Sam Spruell), whose also chasing Snow. One line of dialogue suggests that Ravenna and Finn had, at one time, a sexual relationship. Finally, there’s the climatic battle when Snow rallies the forces of good to confront Ravenna’s evil minions, but it seems overly rushed to get to the one-on-one fight between Snow and the queen.

Of the major actors, Theron dominates the screen and is the main reason to see this version. Even when Ravenna is pulling a major temper tantrum, she manages to humanize her. Chris Hemsworth offers a low-key portrayal of the Huntsman, using the tragedy that haunts the character to form his every action and decision. It’s effective. However, Stewart’s Snow White is the least interesting character. Maybe it’s because Ravenna has kept her locked away in the north tower for ten years and Snow hasn’t really developed a personality. Or maybe it’s because the director didn’t push her to act. Nonetheless, Stewart seems out of place. The dwarves are portrayed by an impressive crew of veteran and full-sized actors (e.g., Bob Hoskins, Ian McShane, Ray Winstone, Toby Jones, Eddie Marsan) miniaturized by special effects and they’re not part of the story for comic relief. “Snow White and the Huntsman,” greatly enhanced by Colleen Atwood’s awe-inspiring costumes, is part adventure, part tragedy, part love story. And, depending on your perspective, that might be a good thing. 6/1/12

Moonrise Kingdom - 3 1/2 smiles

Director Wes Anderson’s latest, “Moonrise Kingdom” is typical Anderson quirky: it’s an adventure, a love story, a Biblical allegory and a touching discourse on the needs of troubled children, but it’s that very quirkiness that makes this movie so enjoyable. And Anderson’s recurring theme of adult cluelessness and the clash between children and those tasked with taking care of them adds depth to the fairy tale-like plot. Young newcomers Jared Gilman and Kara Hayward are well suited for their roles, though Hayward looks older than Gilman. Bill Murray and Frances McDormand play Suzy’s parents, a pair of lawyers who are disconnected from each other as well as their children. Bruce Willis is perfect as the low-key, well-meaning sheriff and Edward Norton is effective as the chain-smoking leader of Sam’s Khaki Scout troop.

Suzy (Hayward) is a sad-faced girl wearing blue eye shadow, saddle shoes and a penchant for looking at the world through binoculars. The coonskin-cap-wearing Sam (Gilman) is an orphan mocked by his peers and cast out by his foster parents. These two outsiders find each other and fall in love on the idyllic (and fictional) island of New Penzance. They make a pact to run away together, setting off a mad search during a hurricane in the summer of 1965.  Although they really have nowhere to go (they live on an island, after all), Suzy and Sam are prepared. They have camping supplies, plenty of books, a record player and a kitten. There’s hope that Suzy and Sam won’t grow up to be dissatisfied and disaffected adults, that they can remain happy forever in this meticulously artificial yet thoroughly romantic setting, “Moonrise Kingdom.” 6/1/12