Movie Monday - 8/08/2011

Finally...some movies to discuss:

Inside Job, a documentary, is a pointed look at the recent economic meltdown leaving quite a bit of the middle-class in dire straights, while the investment bankers were lining their pockets with millions of dollars.  It kind of made me sick.  It is an eye opener…You should see it.

Wild Grass is a hard to follow movie.  Is it because it is in French with English subtitles?  Or just because it is a French movie and they are so subtle sometimes that it is hard to figure out what is going on?  I don’t know, but there were many scenes in which one isn’t sure if it’s real or if it’s Memorex. And can I tell you how slow it is in places? It’s about a man who finds a woman’s wallet. He becomes so obsessed with her, that she has to have the police tell him to cool it, at which time she becomes obsessed with him.  He is seemingly happily married with two grown children.  However, he seems to have a dark side that is never explained in the movie. She is a successful dentist who likes to fly airplanes.  I recognize two of the actors – Emannuelle Devos, who plays another dentist and the good friend of the lead female character, and Mathieu Amalric, who plays a police detective.  Meh.

Old Dogs with Robin Williams and John Travolta was pretty dumb.  The two play close business partners who are charged with taking care of a set of seven-year-old twins.  There were some funny parts – mostly slapstick-ish…but…dumb. 

Tamara Drewe is a dramedy about an ugly duckling, who grew up, had a little plastic surgery and returns to her home town where things get stirred up a bit. The movie is adaptated from the graphic novel of the same name. Gemma Arterton, Roger Allam, Bill Camp, Dominic Cooper, Luke Evans and Tamsin Greig star in this cute, little British film set in the quaint little town of Ewedown.

I didn’t really like My Own Private Idaho, starring River Phoenix and Keanu Reaves…can you tell it’s old?  The two play a couple of male prostitutes in Portland, OR.  Mike (Phoenix) is in love with Scott (Reaves).  Scott is from an affluent family, doing the street urchin thing to aggravate his father.  Mike has narcolepsy – and falls down asleep when his stress level rises.  The two go looking for Mike’s mom and travel to Italy, where Scott falls in love with a girl.  It was gritty and sleazy – there’s drug use – and none of these things make for a bad movie in and of themselves necessarily.  It just didn’t ring my bell.

In Local Color Trevor Morgan plays John, a young wanna-be artist meets one of his idols, Nicholi Seroff, played by Armin Mueller-Stahl.  John talks Nicholi into letting him hang around and maybe picking up some tips from the old man.  It was slow in parts, but kind of a sweet coming of age story.

Hope y'all are staying cool...

MK out.