My Sister's Keeper (2009)

I saw this when it was new and I know I liked it. It's about a girl conceived in order to save her dying sibling. Starring Abigail Breslin as the younger sister, Cameron Diaz and Jason Patric as the parents, and Sofia Vassilieva as the sick one. Breslin was last blogged for Zombieland, Diaz for Annie, and Vassilieva was new to me then and I haven't seen any of her work since. I remember liking Patric in Rush (1991), Sleepers (1996), Your Friends & neighbors (1998), and Narc (2002).

I read the Jodi Picoult book on which this is based and I remember liking that, too. Director Nick Cassavetes (I didn't see The Notebook but really liked Alpha Dog (2006), his fifth feature--this was his sixth, he directed two more and is planning two upcoming ones) adapted the book with Jeremy Leven (co-wrote seven before this and three after).

I just had to put this on the list to satisfy my obsessive-compulsive personality (not disorder) and make a milestone announcement: I thought this made 900 movies summarized (I don't like to say reviewed because I'm usually quite generous) on the blog since I began writing on September 3, 2008. However, I just double-checked the count and apparently I passed 900 five movies ago, so I'm up to 905. Certain Women was #900, but I was in such a bad mood I forgot to add it and others to the count!

When I began writing, I thought I'd go back and write about every movie I had ever seen. That didn't and won't happen. But I got 21 in there that I had seen before that date, so I keep two counts on my index. Another milestone will be coming in a bit.

One more comment. Google/blogger says that in the past month I've had 661 page views here in the USA and over five times that many in France. Bonjour à mes nombreaux amis francais! Apparently I also have readers in Poland, the United Kingdom, Belgium, Canada, Germany, Netherlands, India and Portugal?! I'm honored. Je suis honorée. Jestem zaszczycony. Ik ben vereerd. Ich bin geehrt. मैं सम्मानित किया।. Estou honrado. And thanks to https://www.freetranslation.com!

The Edge of Seventeen (2016)

We loved this edgy coming-of-age comedy about a sardonic, angry, smart, funny, beautiful teenager who's always at the end of her rope. Hailee Steinfeld (last blogged for The Homesman) is outstanding as Nadine, Kyra Sedgewick (most recently in Kill Your Darlings) wonderful as her clueless mother, and Woody Harrelson (last in Now You See Me 2) surprisingly restrained as her favorite teacher. I watched Glee for a while but Blake Jenner (no relation to Caitlyn/Bruce) didn't look familiar to me. He's quite good as Nadine's brother Darian, as is Haley Lu Richardson as her best friend Krista. I also enjoyed the work of Lina Renna as little Nadine.

Kelly Fremon Craig, who wrote one feature script before this, makes her directing debut and it flows beautifully, with snappy, hilarious dialogue.

I must mention Nadine's wacky wardrobe, as designed by Carla Hetland, who also worked on 50/50, among many projects.

The soundtrack is credited to Atli Orvarsson (from Iceland) and four of his songs can be streamed by choosing this movie on his website. Chances are, however, you'll just remember the great songs, streaming here.

Critics and audiences on Rotten Tomatoes are lining up with us, averaging 94 and 88%, respectively. It's in wide release now, so you can catch it on the big screen or wait for the video--it won't lose in translation--but we recommend it highly.

No Pay, Nudity (2016)

Jack and I liked a lot this story of a frustrated middle-aged actor and his friends looking for work in New York. With a distinguished cast headed by Gabriel Byrne and including Nathan Lane and Frances Conroy, it's funny and a little sentimental in a good way. Over ten years ago Amy and I met Byrne when I was consulting on a script that didn't get made. He's a bit of a sentimental guy in person, too. Some of my favorites of his work are Siesta (1987), Miller's Crossing (1990), Cool World (1992), Into the West (1992), The Usual Suspects (1995), and Wah-Wah (2005). Of Lane's film and TV resumé, the standouts are The Lion King (1994), The Birdcage (1996), Trixie (2000), The Producers (2005), Modern Family,  The Good Wife, and The People vs. O.J. Simpson (in the last two he barely cracks a smile). We also just saw him onstage in the revival of The Front Page. Frances Conroy was last blogged for Stone.

Director Lee Wilkof, a middle-aged actor who gets lots of work (94 credits!), makes his directing debut with this picture and has a cameo as an auditioning actor who makes loud, annoying vocalizations in the waiting room. Ethan Sandler is an actor and producer making his feature screenwriting debut.

Craig Richey, no novice, has composed for a number of projects, including two of my favorites by Nicole Holofcener, Lovely & Amazing (2001) and Friends with Money (2006). The soundtrack doesn't seem to be available online but here's a sampler of his movie work and a list of the other songs.

This is in limited release so very few people have seen this yet. We went to a premiere last week. The six critics on Rotten Tomatoes who wrote about it average 83%. Googling it without quotation marks leads to some unsavory results so search only for "no pay nudity." The title refers to the kind of jobs an out-of-work actor can get.

Arrival (2016)

Jack and I enjoyed this sci-fi story of a linguist called by the military to communicate with aliens in the near future. More than just a mash-up of Independence Day and Contact, it has many layers, skillfully woven. Amy Adams handles the layers beautifully as the lead. Her co-stars, including Forest Whitaker, Jeremy Renner, and Michael Stuhlbarg (last blogged for Big Eyes, Dope. The Immigrant, and Miles Ahead, respectively) are strong as well. Fans of Halt and Catch Fire will recognize one of soldiers, Mark O'Brien, who plays Tom in the AMC series.

Director Denis Villenueve (most recently helmed Sicario) keeps the shells (that's what they call the aliens' spaceships) juggled in the air, working from a script by Eric Heisserer (he's written five other screenplays that I haven't seen) who adapted the 1998 novella Story of Your Life by Ted Chiang.

Jóhann Jóhannsson, who scored Sicario and Prisoners with Villeneuve provides music that is occasionally a little heavy handed but very trippy. The whole soundtrack playlist has been removed from YouTube since we saw it nine days ago, but here are a few tracks for your enjoyment: one, two, three.

Marcia said she wanted to see it because it stresses non-violent communication. It definitely does. There's a powerful line that the screenwriter agonized over and then found out that in the final cut, it was in another language with no subtitles. Here it is: In war there are no winners, only widows.

Rotten Tomatoes' critics love this, averaging 93% and its audiences aren't far behind at 82. It's playing pretty much everywhere now.

Independent Spirit Awards

The nominations were announced today. I love the Spirit Awards! The ceremony will be Saturday February 25, the day before the Oscars. They have it in a tent on the beach in Santa Monica. The stars drink and get rowdy, and the hosts are always fun and funny. You can record or watch it live on the IFC channel at 2pm Pacific and 5pm Eastern. If you need to stream it, go to IFC.com. They usually do not show it more than once, nor have I been able to find it after the fact on youtube.

The nominees are now on my annual list of nominees and winners, right under the full index of all movies on babetteflix.

Bad Moms (2016)

Jack and I had a lot of laughs at this terribly silly and lewd farce in a second run theatre today. It stars the comedic talents of Mila Kunis, Kathryn Hahn, and Kristen Bell vs. Annie Mumolo, Christina Applegate, and Jada Pinkett Smith. The first four were last blogged in Annie, The Family Fang, and The Boss (both Bell and Mumolo), respectively. Applegate is best known for her TV work, including 258 episodes of Married with Children (1987-1997), 35 of Samantha Who?, and 35 of Up All Night; her movie roles include the first Anchorman (2004) and Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues; and I liked Pinkett Smith in Bamboozled (2000), Ali (2001), Collateral (2004), The Women, and Magic Mike XXL. In fact, my only complaint about the movie is that the latter has so little to do--one big line, which we both found dumb and kind of gross.

Jack recognized the soccer coach, played by football player J. J. Watt of the Houston Texans. And other faces on the screen include Emjay Anthony (Chef) and Oona Laurence (new to me) as Kunis' kids, Clark Duke (Kick-Ass) as her boss, David Walton (TV: Bent, About a Boy, and a series arc on New Girl) as her husband, Wendell Pierce (lots of TV and movies, including Get on the Bus (1996), Ray (2004), Horrible Bosses, and 32 episodes of the new The Odd Couple, to name just a few) as the principal, Jay Hernandez (Crazy/Beautiful (2001)) as the hot dad, and Wanda Sykes (first and foremost a stand up comedian, she's been in TV shows including The Chris Rock Show, The Drew Carey Show, her own short-lived Wanda at Large, The New Adventures of Old Christine, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Alpha House, Black-ish, and House of Lies) in a funny cameo.

Directed and written by the team of Jon Lucas and Scott Moore, who co-wrote Four Christmases, and wrote (just the two of them) The Hangover, The Change-Up, and a few other things, and directed one other movie before this. There is a sort-of sequel in development: Bad Dads.

The composer is Christopher Lennertz (last blogged for The Boss) whose score, for at least the third time in my blog, has been upstaged by strong pop tunes.

I almost forgot to mention that this was a nice companion to last night's mini-binge (three episodes out of ten so far) of the new FX series Better Things starring Pamela Adlon and created by her and Louis C.K., about a working mom and her three daughters.

Yes, we sorely needed a comedy this week (see my previous post on Certain Women) and Bad Moms definitely filled the bill, brought to us by Rotten Tomatoes' 60% from critics and 70 from audiences. Tickets cost $2.25 each. It'll probably be free if you have cable or streaming TV in the next few months. Be sure not to get the censored version. And be sure not to skip the credits. All six stars chat on screen with their mothers at the end!

Certain Women (2016)

Deb, Jack, and I were not particularly moved by this dreamy tale of four northwestern American women whose three stories barely intersect. The pictures are pretty but the pace and drama were not what we needed on Wednesday afternoon November 9, 2016 (the movie was about to leave town--it's gone now), despite no shortage of talent. First we have Laura Dern (profiled in Wild) in one story, Michelle Williams (last blogged for Oz the Great and Powerful) in another, and Kristen Stewart (most recently in Café Society) with Lily Gladstone (new to me) in the third. Gladstone is terrific with few words and has been nominated for the Breakthrough Actor Gotham Award for this role. Jared Harris (covered in Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows), in the Laura Dern story, plays the most flamboyant character and underlines how laid back the women are.

Acclaimed director/writer Kelley Reichardt (most recently made Meeks' Cutoff) adapted three short stories by Maile Meloy and, as mentioned earlier, the connections between them are tenuous at best. There are a couple of lines that stuck with me, though, one from Dern about sexism in her law career and another from Stewart about her family's expectations. Williams' character is also a bit of a trailblazer but her tightly wound Gina just annoyed me. Again, it could have been the emotions I was feeling that day. Reichardt and the movie have several more nominations and one win so far.

Composer Jeff Grace, who also scored Meek's Cutoff, provides nice tunes which are nowhere to be found online.

Two of my friends and many critics loved this movie, with Rotten Tomatoes' professional average coming in at 89%. Their audiences are more in line with us at 51. Maybe those who don't need to be cheered up will like it better than we did.

The Accountant (2016)

Jack and I expected to like this thriller--about a CPA with Aspergers, shady clients, and guns--and were not disappointed. Ben Affleck is wonderful in the title role and Anna Kendrick reminded me ever so slightly of her role in Rocket Science (2007). Her mother is an accountant who tutored Kendrick in the math necessary for this part. Affleck and Kendrick were last blogged in Gone Girl and The Hollars, respectively.

The very big cast includes good work from J.K. Simmons (most recently in The Meddler), John Lithgow (last in The Homesman), Jon Bernthal (last in Me and Earl and the Dying Girl), Jeffrey Tambor (after I covered his career in Win Win in 2011, he won several Emmys for the transgender father in Transparent), and Jean Smart (though known for 120 episodes of Designing Women (1986-91), her Emmy nominations and wins were for Frasier, Samantha Who, and Fargo, among others, and her movie roles have included Sweet Home Alabama (2002), Garden State (2004), Hope Springs, and Youth in Revolt) (she turned 65 in September--she looks fantastic!).

Director Gavin O'Connor (last helmed Warrior) works from a screenplay by Bill Dubuque (The Judge), which was on the 2011 Black List, the "most liked" unproduced scripts of the year. There's a twist at the end of the movie which Jack predicted and took me by surprise when we saw it ten days ago.

As a fan of composer Mark Isham (I last wrote about him for Beyond the Lights), I enjoyed his score, which I'm streaming now from this playlist.

The critics, with their reviews full of number puns, are rounding down to 51% with audiences counting higher at 84 on Rotten Tomatoes. You don't have to see it on the big screen but it might make more sense for some of the denser shots.

American Pastoral (2016)

Despite dismal reviews, Jack and I enjoyed this story of an idyllic 1950s family shaken by the daughter's 1960s radicalism, with powerful performances by all and nice production values. The feature directing debut of star Ewan McGregor (last blogged for the titular role in The Ghost Writer) co-stars the luminescent Jennifer Connelly (most recently in Noah) as the wife and a haunting Dakota Fanning (last in these pages for The Runaways) as the daughter. Peter Riegert (some of my favorites are Animal House (1978), Chilly Scenes of Winter (1979), Local Hero (1983), Crossing Delancey (1988), The Object of Beauty (1991), and The Mask (1994)) as McGregor's father and Valorie Curry (the intern chased by both Clyde and Doug in ten episodes of House of Lies) as Rita both do notable work as well.

John Romano (before adapting The Lincoln Lawyer, he wrote lots of TV episodes including L.A, Law and Knots Landing, as well as the amusing legal dramedy Intolerable Cruelty (2003)) adapted Philip Roth's Pulitzer Prize (for fiction 1998) winning novel.

Alexandre Desplat (last scored Florence Foster Jenkins) provides a lovely score which you can stream from this link, and it's complemented by this array of songs (including Moon River, which I learned to play on the piano in the very early 60s).

Note to Helene and Judy, see if you can spot the merkin!

As I said, dismal reviews--since we saw it a week ago the critics' averages have risen a point to 21% and the audiences' fallen a point to 44 on Rotten Tomatoes. Still, we liked it a lot. Sufferers of motion picture motion sickness will notice that a few highly tense scenes feature handheld cameras in the arms of runners, but they don't last long, so I won't put this on the list.