The Sleepover: Far from a snooze

The Sleepover (2020) • View trailer 

Three stars. Rated TV-PG, for fantasy peril

By Derrick Bang

This is a silly little film.

 

It’s also reasonably well plotted, crisply paced, family-friendly and — given the proper frame of mind — a lot of fun. Director Trish Sie and scripter Sarah Rothschild toss a quartet of energetic children into a “suspense lite” scenario; while the results certainly won’t set the cinema world on fire, there’s no denying the entertainment value. (You'll find it via Netflix.)

 

Having successfully captured an intruder, our young heroes — from left, Mim (Cree
Cicchino, Lewis (Lucas Jaye), Kevin (Maxwell Simkins) and Clancy (Sadie Stanley) —
are about to learn that he's a WITSEC handler ... in other words, a good guy.

It’s also refreshing, given the genre, that a) these kids are not insufferable brats whose sole purpose is to make all adults look stupid; and b) the story does not succumb to the needless destruction of personal and public property.

 

But yes: We do get a car chase.

 

Adolescent Kevin Finch (Maxwell Simkins) is introduced while fabricating a whopper during a classroom presentation designed to share each student’s family life: an apparently frequent tendency toward wild exaggeration that fails to amuse his teacher. 15-year-old sister Clancy (Sadie Stanley) has a crush on senior Travis (Matthew Grimaldi); she’s also an accomplished cello player, but too shy to perform in public.

 

To Clancy’s greater mortification, parents Margot (Malin Åkerman) and Ron (Ken Marino) refuse to give her a phone, leaving her the only kid in the entire school without one (she insists).

 

To add insult to injury, Clancy’s savvy, über-cool best friend Mim (Cree Cicchino) always is glued to her phone.

 

Clancy further believes that her parents are hopelessly square. Dad, an accomplished pastry chef, forever embarrasses her by (among other things) “working out” — in public — with tiny finger-grippers. Ron actually fits that characterization: Marino, well remembered as smarmy Vinnie Van Lowe on TV’s Veronica Mars, plays the guy as a good-natured doofus.

 

Margot, though, has a bit of an edge; we catch a glimpse when, as school lunch monitor, she confronts a trio of disrespectful eighth-grade jerks.

 

On this otherwise average evening, Kevin is hosting best friend Lewis (Lucas Jaye) on a sleepover; Ron, determined to wean the boys from video games, insists they camp out in the back yard. This doesn’t sit well with timid Lewis, unable to enjoy kid-hood due to a helicopter mother who relentlessly broadcasts his many physical and emotional ailments and shortcomings (more perceived than real, we suspect).

 

Clancy, despite being grounded for smart-mouthing her mother, intends to sneak out with Mim, in order to attend a party at Travis’ house (while his parents are away). After all, he invited her.

 

Rampage: Nothing but noise

Rampage (2018) • View trailer 
Two stars. Rated PG-13, and quite generously, for violence, gore, destruction, dramatic intensity and brief profanity
By Derrick Bang

Art often responds to life.

Back in the 1950s, rising Cold War paranoia and atomic-era anxiety prompted Hollywood to uncork a series of “giant whatzis” movies: giant ants (Them), giant spiders (Tarantula), giant scorpions (The Black Scorpion), and even — I’m not making this up — giant grasshoppers (Beginning of the End).

With Chicago being demolished by a couple of extremely nasty monsters, can one man and
his faithful albino gorilla companion make a difference? This flick would like you to
think so...

These days, the night terrors are induced by misguided genetic editing and greed-driven corporate malfeasance. But the results are the same: giant whatzis movies.

And, frankly, Rampage isn’t much better than most of those 1950s clunkers.

Modern golly-gee-wow special effects can’t conceal the fact that this is a laughably inept flick fueled by a bone-stupid script that can’t even follow its own interior logic. (Actually, “logic” and Rampage are oxymorons.) Four writers take the blame for this kitchen-sink mess — Ryan Engle, Carlton Cuse, Ryan J. Condal and Adam Sztykiel — and I’m amazed they had the collective chutzpah to demand credit for stuff they swiped from other films, and then stitched together like Frankenstein’s monster.

But, then, what can we expect of a movie “developed” from an arcade game?

I wish Mystery Science Theater 3000 still were around; the ’bots would have a great time dissing this dumb turkey.

In fairness, Rampage has one thing going for it: the incandescent presence of Dwayne Johnson. He may have rolled his eyes in private, when the script pages were delivered, but he nonetheless gives an impressively earnest performance. Those who doubt the power of “movie star charisma” need look no further than this misbegotten flick.

Director Brad Peyton certainly doesn’t bring anything to the party; he basically points and shoots, hoping that Johnson’s reasonably well-timed quips will compensate for the sins that sheer momentum can’t conceal. The two of them did the same a few years ago, when they teamed for San Andreas.

To cases, then:

During a prologue that’s a blatant mash-up (and rip-off) of Gravity and Life, we learn that Chicago-based Wyden Technologies, via their Energyne genetics lab, has been conducting naughty — and highly illegal — experiments in an orbiting space station. Things go awry; three small canisters containing Bad Stuff hurl through our atmosphere, meteorite-like, and plow into different parts of the United States.

I'll See You in My Dreams: Thoughtful character portrait

I'll See You in My Dreams (2015) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for drug use and fleeting profanity
By Derrick Bang

Sometimes what seems like a comfortable rut actually is a slow slide into prolonged depression, at which point an unexpected crisis — or two — can transform unconfronted anxieties into utter despair.

Once beyond the initial awkwardness of their disparate ages, Carol (Blythe Danner) and
Lloyd (Martin Starr) discover that they genuinely enjoy chatting, and sharing little intimacies.
The question, moving forward, is where this relationship might go.

That’s the subject of director Brett Haley’s sweet, gentle drama, which draws its strength from a subtle and deeply layered performance by Blythe Danner. She stars as Carol Petersen, a comfortably retired single woman who — if asked —would insist that she has made peace with the unexpected loss of a beloved husband, some 20 years earlier.

After all, Carol’s life is filled with activity, much of it revolving around gardening, golf and boisterous bridge games — not much bridge actually being played — with longtime gal pals Rona (Mary Kay Place), Sally (Rhea Perlman) and Georgina (June Squibb). Carol’s schedule is disciplined to a reasonable degree, from the 6 a.m. wake-up buzz of her alarm clock, to a bit of television before lights out somewhere around 11 p.m. each evening.

But Carol hasn’t actually been alone; she has come to depend upon the constant presence of her beloved dog, Hazel. And therein lies the potential for emotional collapse.

After deftly establishing the parameters of Carol’s routine, Haley and co-scripter Marc Basch open their narrative with a gut-wrenching sequence. Hazel clearly is old, and so we’re not surprised by what occurs ... but animal lovers will have considerable difficulty surviving the subsequent scene in a veterinarian’s office, as Carol bids goodbye to her longtime companion.

Danner plays the scene so persuasively that I wondered if it could be genuine, the actress huskily trying to maintain composure while confronting the need to “do the kind thing” for an actual devoted pet. The scene feels that genuine, as anybody who has been there can attest.

And, suddenly, all the scheduled activities that have structured Carol’s life, for so long, have lost their luster. She’s hard-pressed to identify the actual problem, and at this point — this early in the film — she may not even be consciously aware that her fragility is rising.

Haley’s film is less a conventional drama, with strong plot points, and more a thoughtful tone poem: an often painfully intimate opportunity for us, as viewers, to confront our own perceived stability. The verisimilitude is strong. Danner’s Carol could be the vibrant and cheerful neighbor next door: the one with whom we exchange pleasant greetings, but rarely probe further. In a way, Haley and Basch quietly suggest that there’s much to be gained from getting to know such folks better, because we’re all — each of us — worth knowing better.

Wanderlust: Yet another limp sex farce

Wanderlust (2012) • View trailer
2.5 stars. Rating: R, for sexual content, profanity, drug use and full nudity
By Derrick Bang


I decided, years ago, that American filmmakers simply don’t understand how to make a proper sex comedy. Instead of funny and erotic, the results invariably are embarrassing and smutty.

George (Paul Rudd) can't help feeling aroused when resident sexpot Eva (Malin
Akerman, right) expresses more than casual interest in him. Unfortunately,
George's wife Linda (Jennifer Aniston) finds the dynamic amusing for entirely
different reasons. On the other hand, this is a free-love commune, so who knows
what might happen?

I’m not talking about romantic comedies — which Hollywood does quite well — or the intentionally crass naked teenager romps, such as (depending on your age) Porky’s, American Pie or their myriad clones. For the most part, the latter are designed to be young male wish-fulfillment fantasies: a rather specific and narrow niche.

No, I mean true sex comedies, delivered so well by French cinema: deliciously erotic and genuinely hilarious films in the vein of, say, Cote d’Azur, French Twist, L’Auberge Espagnole, The Valet, The Closet, The Girl from Monaco, Priceless and many, many others going back to classics such as, yes, La Cage aux Folles.

As has been said many times, the French simply have that magic je ne sais quoi, when it comes to bedroom farce. Hollywood ... not so much.

And Wanderlust isn’t about to reverse that trend.

In fairness, director David Wain’s fish-out-of-water saga — co-written with Ken Marino — shows mild promise in the first act. Uptight Manhattanites George (Paul Rudd) and Linda (Jennifer Anniston), struggling to purchase their first slice of New York real estate — a hopelessly overpriced West Village “micro-loft” — see the dream fall apart when both become unemployed.

With no other options, they stuff all their worldly possessions into a car and head to Atlanta, where George’s brother Rick (Ken Marino) and his wife, Marissa (Michaela Watkins), have offered to take them in. This road trip is a hilarious montage of pent-up frustration, simmering hostility and tearful regret: a memorable drive from hell that’ll feel familiar to anybody who recalls a trip under similarly stressed conditions.

If the rest of Wain’s film were up to this one-minute sequence, he’d have comedy gold on his hands.

Highway fatigue prompts a desperate search for overnight lodging; George and Linda wind up in the guest quarters at Elysium, a rural commune populated by colorful free spirits who make our protagonists feel quite welcome. A marijuana-laced evening proves refreshingly comfortable in the company of Wayne (Joe Lo Truglio), a nudist winemaker and would-be novelist; Kathy (Kerri Kenney-Silver), a slightly dreamy chatterbox with the slowest takes in movie history; Almond (Lauren Ambrose) and Rodney (Jordan Peele), a couple sharing the excitement of their first pregnancy; Karen (Kathryn Hahn), a former porn star turned jam maker; Eva (Malin Akerman), the resident sex goddess; Carvin (Alan Alda), the troupe’s drop-out founder; and Seth (Justin Theroux), the alpha male and quasi-spiritual leader.

27 Dresses: Reasonably well-appointed

27 Dresses (2008) • View trailer
3.5 stars (out of five). Rating: PG-13, for profanity and sexual innuendo
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.25.08

27 Dresses seems tailor-made for star Katherine Heigl, who continues her meteoric ascent from television's Grey's Anatomy and last summer's Knocked Up.

After taking a nasty tumble during the waning hours of an otherwise successful
wedding, Jane (Katherine Heigl) is helped to her feet by the solicitous Kevin
(James Marsden), whose presence isn't as accidental as it seems. Even so, as
"meet cute" encounters come and go, this one's pretty good.

Her talent and temperament are perfect for director Anne Fletcher's frothy romantic comedy, and Aline Brosh McKenna's script immediately establishes its charming premise: that Heigl's Jane has become a career bridal attendant, although her own happy ending is nowhere in sight.

We hit the ground running during a harried but not-so-atypical evening, as Jane finds herself catering to two brides on the same night, gamely racing back and forth between both events while changing in the back seat of a cab (a cute bit with Michael Ziegfeld as the flustered cabbie).

Jane fulfills this function not because she runs a professional bridal business — indeed, by day she's the efficient right-hand-gal to self-made entrepreneur George (Edward Burns) — but because, well, she just likes weddings. Likes to help plan them, adores being part of them, and has become indispensable to an ever-lengthening string of friends, acquaintances and office mates whose weddings were a triumph, thanks to Jane's meticulous efficiency and cheerful accommodation to even the most bizarre bridal request.

The latter can be typified by the inevitably hideous choice of bridesmaids' gowns, but even here Jane retains a soft spot in her heart for each of these taste-challenged outfits; every one represents a happy memory.

McKenna's script is peppered with tart dialogue and a reasonably credible approach toward the modern dating scene; the lines are delivered with well-timed crispness by Heigl and a mostly solid roster of supporting players. Top marks go to Judy Greer, who very nearly steals most of her scenes as Casey, Jane's snarky best friend and colleague at George's company, the New Age-y Urban Everest. Watch Casey's expressions, as she follows Jane and George during an early scene at the office; although we're getting important expository dialogue from Heigl and Burns, it's hard to concentrate on anything except Greer.

Jane's rather unusual hobby notwithstanding, her life is complicated by a series of additional issues: She's madly in love with her boss, but only from afar. Although relying on her for everything in a professional capacity, George is oblivious to his devoted assistant's worshipful gaze.

And that situation gets worse with the arrival of Jane's trashy and superficial younger sister, Tess (Malin Akerman), who immediately swoons at the sight of George. Although having nothing in common with him — which becomes a growing issue with Jane, who cannot stand deception — Tess lies like a rug to hook and land the guy, at which point our heroine suddenly is roped into planning a wedding for her own sister ... to the man that she secretly adores.