Bad Teacher (2011)

I had reservations about this but Sarah, Jack, and I laughed A LOT all the way through this slapstick comedy about a foul-mouthed, selfish, gold-digging woman who's a middle school teacher "for all the right reasons: shorter hours, summers off, no accountability." That line is in the trailer, so no spoiler. Cameron Diaz is really funny in the lead. My favorite line about her isn't an exact quote, nor can I find it, but I swear I heard Roger Ebert say on TV that her debut performance in The Mask (1994) could be attributed to her Wonderbra but he was pretty sure it was her talent and comic timing. I put that in my post about You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, coincidentally writing about Diaz' co-star here, Lucy Punch. What I didn't know until just now is that Diaz actually was a Wonderbra model before breaking into movies. I have liked her in most everything I've seen, notably the black comedy The Last Supper (1995), There's Something About Mary (1998), Being John Malkovich (1999), the dramas Gangs of New York (2002) and My Sister's Keeper (2009) (I know I saw this and can't figure out why I didn't write about it). Punch is once again terrific (as in Being Julia (2004) and Dinner for Schmucks), this time with a flawless American accent (she's British)--so good at being the super-intense/crazy co-star. Also noteworthy are Jason Segal (I listed my faves in I Love You, Man) as the sane gym teacher, Justin Timberlake (Alpha Dog (2006), The Social Network) as the dorky, bespectacled substitute who likes boy bands (wink wink), John Michael Higgins (Christopher Guest movie regular, e.g. Best in Show (2000) and For Your Consideration (2006), plus 77 other titles) as the beleaguered principal, and Phyllis Smith (Phyllis on The Office) as the sweet teacher. The blonde student Chase is played by Kathryn Newton, who played Jay Mohr's daughter in Gary Unmarried, now cancelled. And Eric Stonestreet, best known as the queenly Cameron on Modern Family, has a particularly butch cameo.

Second generation director Jake Kasdan (his dad Lawrence has been nominated for four Oscars, for The Big Chill (1983), The Accidental Tourist (1988), and Grand Canyon (1991), the last of which he shared with his wife, Jake's mother, Meg Kasdan, among many credits) did a pretty good job on Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story (2007), five episodes of Freaks and Geeks, and one each of Undeclared and Californication, and we had no complaints about his work here, directing the script written by Gene Stupnitsky and Lee Eisenberg (co-wrote 15 episodes of The Office).

Composer Michael Andrews (I wrote about him in Bridesmaids), though talented, has once again scored a movie where few will notice his soundtrack because there are so many memorable songs. The list is available on imdb (right now tonight the page is down for maintenance and it says "try again in a few hours"), squidoo, and the reelsoundtrack blog (you can listen at the latter two).

The critics are hatin' on this one: 44% on rottentomatoes, though audiences gave it 69% and it scored 6.1 out of 10 on imdb. But we had a good time and I suspect, if you don't over-think it, you will, too.

The Double Hour (La doppia hora - 2009)

We liked this Italian movie which starts out with speed-dating in Turin, Italy, then becomes a love story, then morphs into a thriller. The directing debut of Giuseppe Capotondi, it is fast paced and satisfying. The movie won three awards at the 2009 Venice Film Festival: Best Actress, Best Actor, and Best Italian Film. Kseniya (AKA Ksenia) Rappoport is Russian, but her character Sonia the chambermaid is Slovenian, and she gets more beautiful as the movie progresses.

The original score by Pasquale Catalano is great, as well as the use of songs (here's a list). We saw this after the baseball game yesterday on a road trip a couple of hours south. Because we had never before heard of the movie we decided to check it out. It was obviously a DVD (the little rectangle on the screen that said 1080p before the credits was the giveaway) but it was perfectly formatted and focused so we didn't mind.

Incendies (2010)

Beautiful and powerful, this story of grown twins searching for the father and brother they hadn't known existed evoked tears, gasps, and 1½ laughs from the audience tonight. DON'T LET ANYONE TELL YOU HOW IT ENDS! Don't search google or twitter, and don't reveal it yourself, please. It's not a spoiler to say that much of it takes place in a fictitious Arabic-speaking country (I thought we were supposed to know and felt really dumb when people referred to "the war") and the locations are Montréal, Amman, and another (undisclosed) location in Jordan. Director Denis Villeneuve adapted the screenplay from the stage play of the same name (translation: Scorched) by Wajdi Mouawad. The movie pretty much split the Genie Awards (Canadian Oscars) with Barney's Version and was nominated for the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. Wonderful acting by Mélissa Désormeaux-Poulin and Maxim Gaudette as the twins and Lubna Azabal as their mother, big red chapter headings, and time-specific details make this easier to follow.

Beautiful music by Grégoire Hetzel (some with vocals) is supplemented by two Radiohead songs, You and Whose Army? and Like Spinning Plates. There are a few lines of English but it's mostly in French and Arabic with subtitles. It's long (2:20) and emotional, but worth it! Jack didn't go with me but I spotted several friends sitting nearby.

The Art of Getting By (2011)

Despite our difficulty in finding a positive review, Jack and I sort of liked this story of George, a self-described "teflon slacker" high school senior in NYC (Freddie Highmore). This is director/writer Gavin Wiesen's feature debut, with only one short before it. There certainly are some holes in the screenplay but I don't really get why the critics have been so savage (see rottentomatoes if you like). Highmore (wonderful in Finding Neverland (2004), Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005), and August Rush (2007), and I wanted to see Toast (2010) last weekend but had a conflict) is now 19 and is finally playing his age. I believed him as the talented artist and compulsive homework-avoider (the previous title was Homework). Also a former child actor, Emma Roberts (I wrote about her in It's Kind of a Funny Story) is good as the pretty girl Sally who is still an outsider at this urban prep school. One of the screenplay holes is that Sally and George say that they are each other's only friends, yet they hang out at school with Zoe (Sasha Spielberg, who was in The Kids Are All Right--she looks more like her father Steven and not much like her mother Kate Capshaw) and Will (Marcus Carl Franklin, who was the young black "Bob Dylan" in I'm Not There (2007)). Michael Anganaro (Lords of Dogtown (2005), Snow Angels (2007)) is good as the slightly older artist Dustin who befriends both George and Sally. Rita Wilson (Mrs. Tom Hanks, she co-starred in Volunteers (1985), co-starred in Now and Then (1995), and I don't believe she's had any big roles since, but I always like her, e.g. in That Thing You Do (1996), The Chumscrubber (2005), It's Complicated, more) and Elizabeth Reaser (I liked her in Sweet Land and The Family Stone (both 2005), Puccini for Beginners (2006), Grey's Anatomy as the Jane Doe Alex fell in love with after she got her new face, and The Good Wife as Will's girlfriend) are George and Sally's dysfunctional mothers. Blair Underwood, Jarlath Conroy, and Alicia Silverstone, in descending order, have a little something to do as George's principal, art teacher, and English teacher. And George's stepfather is played by Sam Robards (played Scott Bakula's partner--Chris Cooper's neighbor--in American Beauty (1999) and Haley Joel Osment's dad in A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001), among others), the 49 year old son of Jason Robards and Lauren Bacall, but his is a small part, too. We enjoyed the location photography, as the whole thing was shot in New York City.

There are two soundtrack albums for sale on iTunes, one with all original score by Alec Puro and one with three Puro tracks and nine by various indie artists (none of which are available for individual download). This won't get any Oscar nominations but we found it diverting and I look forward to more Highmore in the future.

The Hangover Part II (2011)

Yes, it's a lot like the first but Jack and I laughed anyway at this raunchy, profane sequel to The Hangover. There's great location photography in Thailand, a kick-ass soundtrack, same leading men, same absent Doug, same monkey (read this), same director, Todd Phillips, and same cinematographer, Lawrence Sher. David Denby in The New Yorker's review (spoilers in the link, so read it later) says, "The two movies offer a comedy of types, a kind of Freudian allegory, with Bradley Cooper enacting the ego, Ed Helms the superego, and Zach Galifianakis the id. Or, to put it more simply, aggression, caution, and stupidity." I'm a big Ed Helms fan, and he is at the center of this one, even singing a funny parody of Allentown on a boat. This time it took me at least half the movie to let go and laugh at Galifianakis' mean spirited behavior, but eventually I did. And now that I'm so familiar with Ken Jeong from Community, I got him, too.

One reason to see this on the big screen is the possibility that Mike Tyson's tattoo artist wins his copyright infringement case. If you have seen the poster you know that Helms' character wakes up the morning after with a tribal tattoo on his face: the same one that Tyson sports in real life. The artist who designed it tried to hold up the movie's release last month. A judge ruled against it, but the case is still in court (read this). I read somewhere that if the studio loses, the tattoo will be digitally altered in the DVD (and at least one line will have to be changed as well). This is the top grossing movie in theatres now (here's the chart--you can sort by any of the words in the header line), having raked in $215,700,000 so far, and was #3 for last weekend alone, so the artist will undoubtedly keep at it, with some deep pockets to pick.  Despite those big piles of money, the critics have mostly hated it, certifying it rotten on rottentomatoes with 35%, although 62% of viewers weighed in with positive reviews.

The soundtrack for purchase (click Listen to all on this link) has 12 songs on it. But there's more music in the movie, as detailed by my fellow blogger monteluz (and annotated by his/her readers) on the reelsoundtrack blog. The wonderful composer Christophe Beck (I wrote about him in Cedar Rapids) worked on this, and, although none of these tracks are available for purchase, he has once again posted clips on his own website.

Oh, and Jack says to tell you that, unlike The Tree of Life, he is smart enough to understand this one. I will add that one should be old enough and relaxed enough not to be put off by some extreme sexual situations and nudity played for laughs, including (just like the last one) in the final photo essay.

In a Better World (Hævnen - 2010)

What a masterpiece! This story of two interconnected families dealing with bullies and retribution (hævnen means vengeance in Danish) on two continents has great acting, a top-notch screenplay, and magnificent visuals, and Jack, Judy, and I didn't even mind the absence of laughs. Oscar and Golden Globe winner for Best Foreign Film, it delivers on all levels. Director Susanne Bier (I haven't seen any of her work, which includes Brothers (Brødre - 2004) on which the American remake Brothers was based) is quoted in imdb, "My first job as a filmmaker is not to make a boring film." With her regular collaborator, writer Anders Thomas Jensen, she has succeeded. Mikael Persbrandt (many credits, none that I've seen) plays Anton, a Swedish doctor who lives in Denmark (Bier often has one Swede in her Danish movies) but works for weeks at a time at a refugee camp in Kenya. His wife, also a doctor, played by Trine Dyrholm (Celebration (Festen - 1998), more), and two boys Elias (newcomer Markus Rygaard) and Morten (11 year old Toke Lars Bjarke has 13 titles to his credit) have their own issues at home. Claus, played by Ulrich Thomsen (was also in Celebration, Brødre, lots more) and his son Christian (newcomer William Jøhnk Nielsen) have moved from London after the death of their respective wife/mother, and Elias and Christian, about 12 years old, become friends. The boys Rygaard and especially Nielsen are outstanding.

As I said above, the cinematography by Morten Søborg is by itself worth the price of admission. The lighting, whether in Kenya or Denmark, has extremes of light and dark, sun and shade, and I was particularly gratified that the focus Wednesday afternoon was as crisp and sharp as I've seen in months in any of our local theatres. Even the subtitles were perfectly legible. Moody music by Johan Söderqvist (previous work with Bier and others) complements the images beautifully. Clips are available on youtube. I suggest pausing until the clip has loaded so you can listen all the way through.

Sad to say, this closed today in our town (we were alone in the room yesterday), but I hope it returns on a big screen for your maximum enjoyment. If not, put it in your netflix queue and watch it in the best home theatre you can buy or borrow.

The Tree of Life (2011)

"I'm not smart enough to understand it," said Jack. He's definitely smart, but not always patient. I, too, grew impatient during this patchwork of dreamy, beautifully photographed vignettes of 1950s small town life, modern day skyscrapers, celestial and terrestrial cataclysms, whispered voiceovers, and barely a whisper of plot. If not being awed by what is supposed to be director/writer Terrence Malick's masterpiece makes us philistines, so be it (my favorite explanation of philistine is at 1:04 in the trailer for The Squid and the Whale (2005)). My faithful readers know I like to concentrate on the good parts and say nice things, but these two and a quarter hours just rubbed us both a bit the wrong way. I suspect I'll hear from Archie about this (he took exception to my negative posting on How Do You Know, and has posted on his own facebook page a video of directors David Fincher and Christopher Nolan rhapsodizing about this one). Someone else who felt as we did is Roger Moore of the Orlando Sentinel, who wrote "This challenging time-skipping rumination is the big screen equivalent of watching that 'Tree' grow." To read his entire review see this link. As Craig Ferguson likes to say, I look forward to your letters.

Not one to rush anything, 68 year old Malick has directed five features in thirty-eight years (he wrote them all, plus a few more) (I saw and enjoyed Days of Heaven (1978), which won him Best Director at Cannes, and The New World (2005) and can't remember if I saw Badlands (1973)--but it was The Thin Red Line (1998) that was most acclaimed) and this one won the Palme d'Or at Cannes 2011. The critics are mostly agreeing with the Cannes jury (apparently the reception at the actual screening was mixed and the link also reveals something about Malick's style on the set, which may explain our reactions), as do many who have posted on the imdb message boards. Contrary to current popular practice, most of those posting have good things to say, except for their snide reactions to people like us and the more extreme people who walked out during the long creation/destruction sections. On rottentomatoes the critics have given this 86% while audiences clock in at 67%.

Here are some things we liked about it: the photography, as noted above, the magnificent sets (the 1950s house and its furnishings, though the family is supposed to be of modest means, are new for the time and, by my standards, fabulous), the skyscrapers, the metal walkways, the locations, the songs (a Malick devotee has provided a complete list on his blog and another fan has made a set of some of it available for download until September 2 here), the original score by Alexandre Desplat which you can hear here (after I wrote about him in The Ghost Writer and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button he was Oscar nominated for scoring The King's Speech), newcomer Hunter McCracken's performance as brooding young Jack O'Brien, Brad Pitt's (I wrote about him in Inglourious Basterds) as the unfulfilled and angry Mr. O'Brien (well, it made me uncomfortable but I recognize it as good acting) with his jutting lower jaw, the baby and toddler scenes, and the other two sons, played by Laramie Eppler and Tye Sheridan, the former of whom really looks like he could be Pitt's son (thanks, Judy, for suggesting that).

Here's something else I didn't like: quick camera movements (in the 1950s sequences) sent me back several rows and reaching for my motion sickness remedies--ginger candy this week. This is going on the Motion Picture Motion Sickness (MPMS) list.

Although Sean Penn is listed as a star, he is in perhaps 20 minutes, as the 21st century Jack O'Brien, who is still troubled--we know that from his face and body language. But he doesn't talk. Jessica Chastain (soon to be seen in The Help (2011)), as Mrs. O'Brien, with her ethereal porcelain skin and pale copper hair, has more to do.

We saw two movies Monday: first this, then Midnight in Paris, as we suspected we would need some comic relief. Did we ever! The good news: it made the latter all the more enjoyable.