Bad Words
Jason Bateman makes his directorial debut with this R Rated indie comedy that sees him attempting to drop his Mr.Put-Upon-Nice-Guy persona while starring in a film that doesn't exactly work without it.
Bateman plays Guy Trilby a foul mouthed, negative, man-child with a savant way with words who has, through a loop-hole and with the support of reporter Kathryn Hahn, entered the Golden Quill spelling bee much to the chagrin of it's organisers Allison Janney and Philip Baker Hall and the parents of the children, the other participants.
The film is a short, well acted and competently directed, verbal, indie comedy. The humour is, at times, very rude, crude but pleasingly inventive and Bateman, especially, seems to be relishing the role. Good thing too as he holds the whole thing together.
Which is more than can be said for the script. The tagline to the film is 'the end justifies the mean' and the fact of the matter is, it really doesn't. Whether you find spelling competitions important or not, nothing really justifies the cruelty Guy Trilby unleashes on, not only, the people directly involved in the competition but just general people in the world, funny though a lot of it is. His personal vendetta effects way more people than the actual, solitary focus of it and I guess it's just down to Bateman's like-ability as an actor, the genuinely funny dialogue and the fact that we are stuck following him for the whole movie that keeps us, the audience, dubiously 'on his side'.
There is a sub-plot about his befriending a child, a fellow contestant, and 'tearing up' the town with him in the evenings which, I suppose, is intended to endear him to us a little and play to the rebel in all of us but some of the things they do, including causing a stolen lobster to lacerate a man's genitals, seem a tad cruel for no reason, as well.
Now before you think I am taking this all too seriously, let me explain. The film IS funny. Taken on face value, if you find vicious, dark, crude humour for the sake of it funny, then you are going to love it and there was much about it I did enjoy. Films, however, whether people like it or not, have to have characters, plots and motivations that make relative sense within their presented frame work and while "it's just a comedy" may excuse a lot of illogical or unforgivably cruel behaviour, the fact that the film, ultimately, asks us to give a hoot about this selfish, arrogant arse hole of a man means that we have to, at least, buy into the story and care a little, when it doesn't give us a lot of satisfactory reasons to.
Had he participated in the contest without cheating and eliminating some of his opponents in humiliating ways or had he befriended the kid, torn round the town but not hurt a man's penis with a large clawed sea creature then his character might have been a little more redeemable, while being no less funny.
There are echoes of Wes Anderson in the characters and the plot, especially Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums without, of course, it being anywhere nearly as charmingly presented or stylish.
A worthy debut, though, for Bateman as a director and interesting to see the R Rated comedy given the mumble core indie treatment.
7 out of 10
Couples Retreat - 20th December 2010
I could've done with a Muppets Christmas Carol or a Scrooged but sadly no, I was stuck with this.
Now I have prefaced this review with the fact that I was sick, let me also preface it with the fact it is the second time I have sat through this film and so this is my sicky, second time viewing experience based opinion, ok? good.
I am going to be a little kinder on this film than I might have been if it was my first viewing, I remember leaving that first experience pretty disgusted with all involved because it is true to say that this film is almost entirely devoid of laughs.
The thought that I had this time was, actually, looking at it again, it is a companion piece to The Break Up in many ways. That was a film that was also billed as an hilarious relationship comedy when really, despite some of its more ridiculous and outlandish scenes, it was actually a fairly successful attempt to look at what couples actually go through in a more serious and inwardly comic way than a laugh out loud comedy riot.
Now what you get with Couples Retreat is in no way as well scripted, well thought out, well directed or as well acted as The Break Up and it's a sad fact that its unfunny, outlandish, cliche'd and often vulgar scenes far out weigh any actual drama or comic comment on relationships but those knowing observations are in there if you want to look out for them. It's also a film that if you have absolutely nothing else to watch and you want to kill a couple of hours watching some comedic actors you maybe once liked take a holiday together then put this on, if you want to watch a film in which some comedic actors you may still like take a holiday and discuss relationships then watch Forgetting Sarah Marshall.
Which brings us to the cast, a crazy ensemble of actors who have all appeared in some of the funniest films and some of the best TV shows of the 21st century, people you may have laughed at, liked and even admired at one time all show up to prove time and time again that comedy doesn't work when you throw money at it, oh and speedos, not really funny either, just old, embarrassing and desperate. Also, if you want me to care if these people get back together or not, make them either funny enough to forgive their hideous antics or likable enough that you don't want to punch them in their soft-cotton pajama wearing, swanning about on a tropical paradise getting a tan type, podgy and miserable looking faces.
It's actually a little unforgivable that all these people could be so bad. Vince Vaughn has been on a downward slope for sometime and is pretty awful as the lead in most of his movies, he is usually better as part of an ensemble, as a second tier character or as a cameo (see Swingers, Anchorman, Old School etc.) and make no mistake, there's a reason he's front and center on the poster, this movie is all about him. Sure the plot is predicated on the idea that Jason Bateman and Kristen Bell's marriage is having problems and yes usual Vaughn cronies, John Favreau and the others get their 5 minutes in the spotlight but most of the film is Vaughn talking, talking and talking. Well, actually, it's more like him whinging, whinging and whinging and it's repetitive, in a monotone, thoroughly unlikeable and surprisingly unfunny.
I said I was going to be kinder on this movie than I would've been the first time I saw it and this is me being kind, so you can only imagine just how rotten I thought it was originally but it's true to say that I did enjoy it a little more the second time, meaning that, in my ill stupor, I didn't find it quite so wretched but really absolutely everyone involved in this knows better and could do better.
3 out of 10 pineapples with a straw in.
Points from the wife 2 out of 10
The Switch - 21st August 2010
Ok, if you've seen the trailer to this then you know the story and you know the outcome.
You know that single late 30s woman wants baby. Her improbable best friend is a neurotic, hypercondriac, commitment-phobe who gets humourously drunk one night, implausibly swaps sperm with the original donor and 7 years later when the kid's all cute and inquisitive, it's up to the man to grow up, learn, change, tell the woman his mistake and win her back after the inevitable argument, resentment and realisation that really she loved him all along.
To say nothing of the old chestnut that, because of alcohol, he conveniently 'forgets' what he did for 7 years!
Going into these types of formulaic rom-coms time and time again you get to recognise the patterns very quickly and so the film becomes less about the destination and more about the ride. You also find your tolerance for complete and utter nonsense that borders on inane crap is made higher if either the performances, or the actors trying to give those performances, are watchable.
In the case of The Switch a couple of them are but it's not the couple in question, it's Jason Batemen and, the always wonderful, Jeff Goldblum. Without them this film would've been unrivaled agony to sit through. The kid in question is very good as well considering what a precocious little turd we could've been lumbered with and all in all, and I hate to say this as I would love the women to be good too, but if you're watching the three boys then you're ok. The film is funny enough, quirky enough and has enough little interesting ideas and scenes that you just about forgive it all its failings.
Let me start this next section of the review by saying I have no problem, usually, with Jennifer Aniston. Yes she has made some horrendous choices of late, The Bounty Hunter and Love Happens, but we should never forget she's also in Office Space, The Good Girl and The Break Up. She's a very competent comedienne and when given the right script she can shine. The totally mad and bonkers thing about The Switch is actually how little she is given to do. The film focusses, quite surprisingly, on Jason Bateman's quite complex character Wally and then later on his relationship with his son.
Jennifer Aniston's character, sadly, doesn't have a character.
Yet again in a major Hollywood film they haven't bothered writing a part for the actors beyond pieces on a board being moved around to fulfill whatever idiotic plot device they need to speed this bland train towards it's predictable and thoroughly beige finale. For example:
1. We are not sure why she wants a baby, except the inevitable tick tocking of her biological clock, which we have to assume because we are never even told her age!
2. We are never told really how or why her and Wally are best friends (especially as soon as she gets pregnant she leaves Wally and disappears for 6 years with apparently very little communication - what? in these days of e-mail, Facebook and cheap long distance calls!),
3. Except for a throw away scene and the odd line, there is absolutely no explanation of her career status. If you were in TV wouldn't you have the person, I don't know, exhibit some passion for the career? or at least mention it in passing
4. It makes little to no sense that she would have a whacked out, crazy, new agey friend like the annoying, grating and hideous Juliette Lewis character (seemingly thrown in there to give the film that thin veneer of boiled anus the studio execs so clearly thought it lacked)
5. Despite not wanting Wally's sperm at the beginning of the film because he is so neurotic and crazy, she happily raises a kid who is absolutely nuts without batting an eyelid and, although you can forgive her slightly for never expecting foul play on Wally's part (because it's so ludicrously far-fetched), when she ends up dating who she thinks was the donor (now conveniently divorced) she never stops and thinks, wait a minute this man is absolutely nothing like my child at all.
In fact she has so little character that the kid only seems to display Wally's personality traits and none of hers.
This lack of character or fitting characters to suit a scene extends to her beyond-irritating female friend played by the why-doesn't-she-just-give-it-up-now wrinkly mess of Juliette Lewis who, as I said earlier, is there literally to be annoying (because irritaing = funny, right?) and to the donor who goes from a handsome, nervous, married professor of Feminine Studies to a grinning chump and simple man-child who is into rock climbing and hanging out at manly cabins by the lake because Wally's the sensitive one, remember...
None of it really makes any sense and the only reason to watch this is for the Jeff and Jason show which yields the films funniest moments in the film and also to be pleasantly surprised that a character as seemingly messed up and occasionally dark as Wally's character exists in a throw-away rom-com of this type.
6 out of 10 french toasts
Points from The Misses 7 out of 10 french toasts