Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire — Give 'em a call!

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire (2024) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for supernatural action/violence, mild profanity and suggestive references

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 3.22.24

Sometimes dreams do come true.

 

When 2021’s Ghostbusters: Afterlife proved successful, with its (mostly) new cast of younger characters, those of us who’ve adored this franchise since 1984 thought, Boy, wouldn’t it be nice if the new gang and the entire old gang got together in the next entry?

 

The inquisitive Ghostbusters — from left, Phoebe (Mckenna Grace), Podcast (Logan Kim)
and Ray (Dan Aykroyd) — are horrified by what Hubert Wartzki (Patton Oswalt) reveals
about the mysterious brass orb in their possession.

Well, it appears that the notoriously fickle Bill Murray decided that he couldn’t miss out on the fun this time. He, Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson and Annie Potts have key roles in this Earth-shattering adventure.

But the planetary threat comes later. As was the case with Afterlife, director Gil Kenan and co-scripter Jason Reitman take their time with smaller matters that allow solid character development. The focus this time is on Phoebe Spengler (Mckenna Grace), who — following her family’s destructive Eccto-1 chase through New York City streets, in pursuit of a shimmering Sewer Dragon ghost — gets benched by the infuriated Mayor Walter Peck (William Atherton), because, well, at 15 she’s a minor. 

 

It gets worse. The contemptuous Peck — Atherton, at his snarling best — warns Callie Spengler (Carrie Coon), Trevor Spengler (Finn Wolfhard) and Gary Grooberson (Paul Rudd) that he’s waiting for just one more excuse to shut down the Ghostbusters. 

 

He also wants to raze their beloved firehouse headquarters.

 

(You’d think the former team’s past accomplishments would have counted for something. But People In Authority never learn.)

 

Elsewhere, Podcast (Logan Kim) continues to help Ray Stantz (Aykroyd) become a YouTube influencer, with his weekly online explorations of everyday household objects that either are haunted ... or merely old. Ray is surprised, one day, when an opportunistic slacker, Nadeem Razmaadi (Kumail Nanjiani), turns up hoping to trade a box of his grandmother’s old possessions for fast cash. The contents include a mysterious, softball-size brass orb covered with ancient glyphs.

 

Still elsewhere, at the Paranormal Research Center run by Winston Zeddemore (Hudson), he and Lucky (Celeste O’Connor) — assisted by brainy newcomer Lars Pinfield (James Acaster) — have perfected next-gen equipment to extract and contain ectoplasmic essence.

 

As for Peter Venkman (Murray) ... well, rumor has it that if you want to get in touch with him, you leave a message on an answering machine somewhere (which, believe it or not, is the only way people can try to get Murray to accept a role, in the real world).

Ant Man and the Wasp: Quantumania — Diminishing returns

Ant Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023) • View trailer

2.5 stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for mild profanity and relentless action violence

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 2.17.23 

Yeesh. What a mess.

 

This newest Marvel Cinematic Universe entry is a classic “kitchen sink” movie: Scripter Jeff Loveness has thrown everything on the wall, in the feverish, desperate hope that something will stick.

 

Kang (Jonathan Majors, right) makes it clear that if Scott (Paul Rudd) refuses to cooperate,
something very bad will happen to his daughter ... which he then will be forced to
re-live for eternity.

Paul Rudd’s Ant Man always has been a bad joke in his own series: a smug, defensive, self-deprecating bumbler cast adrift in adventures that suffer from a clumsy blend of smash-’em-up special effects and forced humor. They’re silly children’s films, completely at odds with the more traditionally heroic stance he displayed as a supporting character in Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: End Game.

(I still wince at the memory of the ill-advised tabletop toy train battle that climaxed 2015’s Ant Man. Ouch.)

 

Director Peyton Reed, determined to maintain the style of Ant Man’s two previous starring outings, has made this third adventure another silly children’s film.

 

Events begin with this family unit happily reunited, in the wake of Avengers End Game: Scott Lang (Rudd), his sweetie-pie Hope (Evangeline Lilly), their now-teenage daughter Cassie (Kathryn Newton), Hope’s mother Janet (Michelle Pfeiffer) and father Hank (Michael Douglas).

 

Cassie has matured into an 18-year-old social activist: a timely nod to current events in this San Francisco setting. She also possesses her grandfather’s passion for science and technology, and — unbeknownst to Scott, Hope and particularly Janet — has been working with Hank to establish a connection to the molecular level of the microscopic Quantum Realm.

 

When Janet does find out, she’s horrified … because, well, y’see, she never explained what happened during the 30 years she was stuck in the Quantum Realm, or why it’s so dangerous.

 

(Yes, this is one of those contrived calamities that wouldn’t exist if characters actually talked to each other.)

 

Ah, but too late! Just as Janet frantically demands that Hank and Cassie cease their efforts, all five — along with the contents of Hank’s lab — are sucked into the weird landscapes and even weirder creatures of the Quantum Realm.

 

Which, sad to say, looks an awful lot like last November’s Strange World. Given that both films emerged under the Disney banner, one suspects a serious case of Looking Over Each Other’s Shoulders.

 

Ghostbusters: Afterlife — Definitely worth a call

Ghostbusters: Afterlife (2021) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for supernatural action and intensity

Available via: Movie theaters 

By Derrick Bang

This is just as much fun as the 1984 original.

 

But it goes deeper than that. Director Jason Reitman — who co-wrote this new film’s script with Gil Kenan — also honor that four-decades-old classic. Although we’re introduced to an entirely new set of characters, the all-important tone and balance are maintained: same snarky humor and whimsical atmosphere, along with some genuinely scary jolts and gotcha moments.

 

Following a wild, hell-for-leather chase, Trevor (Finn Wolfhard, left) Phoebe (Mckenna
Grace) and Podcast (Logan Kim) realize that something definitely is wrong inside the
ominous mountain outside their small town.

(Reitman and all concerned wisely pretend that 2016’s abysmal, gal-oriented remake never happened.)

Composer Rob Simonsen even quotes much of the late Elmer Bernstein’s score for the 1984 film, at first teasing us with occasional chordal hints, and finally — as we move into the exciting third act — unveiling Bernstein’s primary themes in their entirety. 

 

(Bearing in mind how much of Bernstein’s music is used, a highly visible co-credit for this film’s score would have been proper, rather than the tiny “original themes” acknowledgment buried deep within the voluminous end credits crawl.)

 

Considerable time has passed in this franchise’s universe, as it did in the real world. Following a spooky, suspenseful prologue, we meet single mom Callie (Carrie Coon), her 15-year-old son Trevor (Finn Wolfhard) and 12-year-old daughter Phoebe (Mckenna Grace). Everything has gone wrong in poor Callie’s life, up to a sudden eviction that leaves them homeless.

 

With nowhere else to go, they drive to the tiny community of Summerville, Oklahoma, where her long-estranged father spent the final decades of his life in a ramshackle farmhouse. Callie hopes to sell the place and its contents for enough to make a fresh start, but a local Realtor (Annie Potts, fleetingly reprising her role as Janine Melnitz) gently explains that the land is worthless, and the property burdened by debt.

 

So they settle in. Reluctantly.

 

Trevor, a typical teenage boy, immediately makes a clumsy play for Lucky (Celeste O’Connor), who works at a retro, roller-skating fast-food joint. He’s obviously punching above his weight, but she finds him amusing, and tolerates his presence; he soon joins her clique of friends.

 

Callie, mindful that her curious, super-smart but socially hopeless daughter needs some sort of focus, enrolls Phoebe in the local middle school’s summer session science class. She immediately comes to the attention of Podcast (Logan Kim, utterly adorable), so named because he constantly films and interviews anybody who foolishly fails to evade him.

 

The irrepressibly cheerful Podcast is an impetuous, fearless chatterbox; Phoebe is quiet, shy and stoic. She also can’t tell a joke to save her life (a cute running gag with a terrific third-act payoff). But they’re both inquisitive and boldly (foolishly?) scientific. Naturally, they become fast friends.

 

Phoebe also catches the eye of the class teacher, Gary Grooberson (Paul Rudd), an affable guy with a laser-focused interest in seismology: specifically the region surrounding Summerville, which seems prone to far more than its share of earthquakes.

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Diminutive delight

Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for sci-fi action violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.6.18

OK, this character is growing on me.

If only a bit.

With FBI agents and criminal mercenaries determined to snatch her father's technology,
Hope (Evangeline Lilly) prepares for battle as the Wasp, while Scott (Paul Rudd)
reluctantly suits up as Ant-Man.

2015’s Ant-Man was a train wreck, due to its insufferably smug tone and an over-reliance on Three Stooges-style farce: a rare miscalculation in the carefully plotted Marvel Universe franchise.

This sequel, having nowhere to go but up, wisely executed a course correction. Star Paul Rudd is less haughty, and therefore more sympathetic; co-star Evangeline Lilly’s considerably expanded role is a welcome change; the characters’ size-shifting abilities are put to much better use; returning director Peyton Reed toned down the gratuitous slapstick; and — definitely a relief — the core plot is grounded in a manner wholly removed from the universe-shattering consequences of recent Marvel entries.

The villains here have sensible real-world motives: greed and self-preservation.

Best of all, the script — fine-tuned by no fewer than five credited writers, along with (no doubt) more behind the scenes — blends the obligatory action with plenty of larkish banter, all well delivered at a slow-burn tempo.

Points, as well, to whoever thought to reference 1954’s Them!

All this said, there’s still a sense that The Powers That Be don’t quite know what to do with this character: that he’s a second-string joke not granted the respect that his abilities should demand. Again, this may be down to Rudd — a credited co-scripter — who rarely looks like he’s taking any of this seriously.

The same could be said of Chris Pratt’s handling of Peter Quill, in the adjacent Guardians of the Galaxy series … but Pratt has a better acting range, and is a helluva lot more charming.

Anyway…

The “busted” Scott Lang (Rudd) remains under house arrest, thanks to his illegal alliance with Captain America, in 2016’s Civil War. Scott is a mere three days away from being freed from the ankle monitor that prevents outer-world quality time with beloved daughter Cassie (cute-as-a-button Abby Ryder Fortson). Happily, relations with ex-wife Maggie (Judy Greer) and her new companion Paxton (Bobby Cannavale) have improved; they’re now sympathetic to Scott’s plight.

Ant-Man: A huge disappointment

Ant-Man (2015) • View trailer 
2.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for action violence and some rather nasty peril
By Derrick Bang

Well, it was inevitable: Mighty Marvel finally stumbled.

This film’s problems are numerous, but the largest issue is one of tone; director Peyton Reed, apparently adopting 1989’s Honey, I Shrunk the Kids as his template, has emphasized slapstick sight gags and comic relief supporting characters to a point that pretty well destroys any of this story’s potential drama.

Scott Lang (Paul Rudd, center) listens attentively as Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) explains
the many hazards likely to be encountered during a clandestine assault on his own
company's research labs. For these reasons and many others, Hank's daughter, Hope
(Evangeline Lilly), believes Scott wholly wrong for the task.

The nadir is a climactic duel to the death between miniscule characters, which takes place within a child’s tabletop train set: a sequence that absolutely, positively doesn’t work on any level. And then, just to make a bad idea even worse, Reed punctuates this clash with an unexpectedly gigantic Thomas the Tank Engine, its enormous plastic eyes bouncing back and forth in dismay.

Just as mine were doing.

Reed’s sledge-hammer efforts at comedy are bothersome, but — in fairness — he can’t be blamed for trying to make the best of a bad situation. Ant-Man has been a troubled production for years, during a lengthy gestation in the hands of British writer/director Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead and The World’s End, among others), whose sly, subversive brand of humor certainly would have been better than what we wound up with here.

But the project was ripped from his hands at the last moment, the script subsequently re-written by Adam McKay and star Paul Rudd. McKay is responsible for numerous Will Ferrell projects, notably Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy and its sequel, Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby and this year’s Get Hard. I submit that Ferrell’s favorite scripter can’t, by definition, be right for anything taking place in Marvel’s ambitious film universe.

So: What were Marvel and Disney thinking?

Rudd’s meddlesome hand is equally evident. The star clearly shaped the script to fit the insufferable smugness that has become his go-to screen persona, rather than — as always should be the case — modulating his performance to suit the character’s needs. But the latter undoubtedly would require a level of acting beyond Rudd’s capabilities, and thus we’re stuck with his usual lackadaisical swanning from one scene to the next.

Rudd simply doesn’t seem to care about this character, or indeed the entire film. Ergo, why should we?

The core story follows the broad strokes established during several decades in the Marvel comic book universe, with genius scientist Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) having perfected a process that allows him to shrink to ant-size, while maintaining his molecular density in order to (among other things) deliver full-strength punches. Along the way, he also developed the means to communicate with ants, and thus can command massive insect armies to help take out nefarious villains in his guise as Ant-Man.

But all that was years ago. Wary of the military applications contemplated by Howard Stark (John Slattery) and his weasel corporate associate Mitchell Carson (Martin Donovan, suitably smarmy), Pym retreats into seclusion. And since Ant-Man’s brief “career” remained under the public radar, the very notion of such a superhero has become little more than an urban myth.

Admission: Not quite top marks

Admission (2013) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rating: PG-13, for occasional profanity and mild sexual candor
By Derrick Bang

Paul Weitz obviously courts variety; his writing and directing résumé includes everything from dumb comedy (American Pie, Little Fockers) and impudent horror (Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant) to the heartfelt relationship dramedy of About a Boy.

Admissions officer Portia (Tina Fey) can't understand why John (Paul Rudd, right) is so
enthusiastic about getting Jeremiah (Nat Wolff) into Princeton; as far as she can tell,
this young man — although certainly personable — just isn't university material, let
alone Princeton material. But she's about to learn a detail that will seriously
compromise her objectivity.

His newest film, Admission, belongs in the latter’s company; its frequently whimsical, romantic-comedy trappings are blended with some sharp social commentary about the lengths to which parents and students will go, to ensure entry to an appropriately prestigious university.

That’s a delicate balance to maintain, and for the most part scripter Karen Croner succeeds; we’re never quite sure whether it’s appropriate to root for what the central characters seem to want, in this adaptation of Jean Hanff Korelitz’s perceptive novel. Even well-motivated actions have unfortunate consequences, and one’s past has a way of revealing that an apparently “comfortable” life may be little more than a façade.

Admission also is a big-screen starring vehicle for Tiny Fey, who needs a solid next step in a career that has been dominated, until recently, by her all-consuming involvement with television’s 30 Rock. Fey is smart, savvy and sharp: an all-around talent who hasn’t always been served well by her occasional trips to the big screen. She was ill-used in trivial fluff such as Date Night and The Invention of Lying, and her more successful presence in Baby Mama had just as much to do with co-star (and frequent cohort) Amy Poehler.

In a nutshell, then, Fey could use a few starring roles that grant her characters with the all-essential blend of intelligence, comic impulsiveness and vulnerability that has made 30 Rock’s Liz Lemon such a delight for so many years. Weitz and Croner come close to granting her the necessary formula in Admission, although Fey’s character here is just a bit too much the helpless victim for my taste. But that’s a personal judgment call, and likely not enough of an issue to bother most viewers.

Portia Nathan (Fey) is an admissions officer at Princeton University, one of the dozen or so “gatekeepers” who evaluate thousands of applicants every spring, and then decide which anxious high school seniors will win entry within these Ivy League walls.

Korelitz is a former part-time application reader for Princeton, so if this aspect of Weitz’s film has the queasy, casually cruel tone of reality, it’s no accident. Korelitz knows the territory, and Croner has done her best to replicate the impossible necessity of such a job: of the need to choose between this gymnast with multiple extracurricular activities, or that impassioned scholar with an aptitude for different languages.

Korelitz’s book employs a narrative device that allows us to eavesdrop on various application essays; Weitz and Croner replicate that gimmick here by having Portia imagine these various young hopefuls standing in front of her, as they eloquently argue their own merits ... only to drop through a hidden trap door and vanish forever, as she regretfully discards yet another fat orange folder.

This Is 40: Fractured family frolic

This Is 40 (2012) • View trailer
Three stars. Rating: R, for relentless crude humor, sexual candor, pervasive language and drug use
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.21.12

Some perceptive truths about marriage, mid-life crises and parental angst linger around the edges of This Is 40, but they tend to be overshadowed by Judd Apatow’s reflexive insistence on vulgar humor, crude slapstick and bewildering plot detours. Obviously, he just can’t help himself.

Pete (Paul Rudd), having failed to realize that Debbie (Leslie Mann) could use some
help while getting their daughters ready for school, attempts to recover from this tactical
error while Sadie (Maude Apatow, far left) and Charlotte (Iris Apatow) watch with
wary amusement.

Nor should he, I suppose, since many of his films — either as producer, director or writer — tend to be crowd-pleasers. But we must remember that his lengthy 21st century résumé reads very much like the gag quotient in any one of his projects: Every Bridesmaids or Superbad follows on the heels of a bomb such as Drillbit Taylor, Funny People or Get Him to the Greek ... just as the truly funny bits in This Is 40 are bookended by stuff so forced and ill-advised that we can’t help wondering what Apatow was smoking that day.

Maybe that’s why This Is 40 runs a ridiculously self-indulgent 134 minutes. With that much time on his side, and that many comedic shots in the barrel, some of the humor is bound to stick.

Although Apatow oversees a busy comedy empire, This Is 40 is only his fourth feature as director, following The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up and the tediously morose Funny People. This new film, something of a peripheral sequel to Knocked Up, focuses on the five-years-later lives of Pete and Debbie (Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann), that film’s sidebar characters.

Except that Katherine Heigl, who played Debbie’s sister Alison in Knocked Up, is nowhere to be seen here. Apparently she got lost in translation.

As this new film’s title suggests, events center around the ramp-up to Pete’s impending 40th birthday. He’d normally share this milestone with Debbie, but a refusal to face the onset of middle age has prompted her to deny her own birthday; indeed, she even rolls back the clock and claims a younger age, a running gag that becomes truly hilarious during a routine doctor’s office visit, when various nurses and receptionists try to nail down her birth year.

That scene works, by the way, because Apatow goes for subtle underplaying, rather than his usual, last-row-of-the-upper-balcony broad strokes.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower: Enchanting coming-of-age drama

The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012) • View trailer
4.5 stars. Rating: PG-13, for drug and alcohol use, sexual candor and brief violence
By Derrick Bang

Judging by the number of perceptive, achingly poignant high school misfit dramas produced over the years, being unpopular must’ve been a whole lot more popular than it seemed at the time.

After unknowingly devouring some marijuana-laced brownies, Charlie (Logan Lerman,
center) unintentionally becomes the hilarious star of his first party. But new friends
Sam (Emma Watson) and Patrick (Ezra Miller) ignore this opportunity to humiliate him,
instead taking care to ensure that Charlie survives the experience with his dignity
(mostly) intact.

Stephen Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower, published in 1999, has sold more than a million copies and become something of a modern Catcher in the Rye (an earlier classic, perhaps not coincidentally, said to be a favorite of Chbosky’s young protagonist). Perks also has the distinction of being one of the top entries in the American Library Association’s list of most frequently challenged and banned books, in 2004 and from ’06 through ’09 (where it peaked, at No. 3) ... which, in my mind, merely proves that Chbosky did an excellent job.

Hollywood naturally came calling, but Chbosky held onto his baby, mindful of the many horror stories revolving around successful authors who had seen their popular works destroyed by other hands. Meanwhile, he nurtured his varied talents by scripting the 2005 film adaptation of Rent and creating, writing and producing the 2006-08 TV series Jericho. A decade earlier, he also wrote, directed and produced The Four Corners of Nowhere, a little-seen 1995 indie film which I suspect is about to be rescued from obscurity.

Point being, Chbosky earned the right to script and direct Perks, and has done a commendable job. His angst-ridden saga of emotional isolation is well cast, impeccably acted, sensitively directed and — no surprise here — impressively faithful to the book. The film will be embraced both by young readers who devoured the epistolary novel, and by older movie fans who remember seeing themselves in John Hughes’ equally insightful teen dramas of the late 1980s (Pretty in Pink, The Breakfast Club and others).

Perks is, in short, destined to become one of the defining teen dramas of the early 21st century.

The year is 1991, as the precocious but socially awkward Charlie (Logan Lerman) begins his first morning as a freshman at Pittsburgh’s Mill Grove High School. He arrives in quiet terror, already counting down the days until he can flee as a graduating senior.

He’s smart and perceptive, easily able to answer his English teacher’s introductory questions ... but only privately, in his opened notebook, rather than risking peer censure by raising his hand and branding himself a teacher’s pet. But the instructor, Mr. Anderson (Paul Rudd), notices; a tentative bond is formed.

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.

How Do You Know: Hard to be sure

How Do You Know (2010) • View trailer for How Do You Know
3.5 stars (out of five). Rating: PG-13, for profanity and mild sensuality
By Derrick Bang

Sweetest movie proposal scene ever.

And no, I’m not revealing anything that has to do with our stars. One of the hallmarks of a sharp script – and well-directed film – is the degree to which attention is paid to the smallest characters. Writer/director James L. Brooks (Terms of Endearment, Broadcast News, As Good As It Gets) delivers precisely those goods in How Do You Know, and we can’t help being charmed by everybody from an observant doorman (John Tormey) to a savvy psychiatrist (Tony Shalhoub, making the most of a single scene).

When Lisa (Reese Witherspoon) invites George (Paul Rudd, right) inside for a
brief visit, she's surprised to be dressed down by Matty (Owen Wilson), who
objects because she's living in "his" place ... rather than sharing digs in "their"
place. (Ergo, she should have "asked permission" before having any guests.)
Not for the first time, Lisa subsequently sees the need to re-evaluate her
relationship with Matty.

Indeed, Shalhoub’s sage advice to our heroine should be stitched onto a sampler and mounted on the wall adjacent to everybody’s kitchen.

Perhaps this also explains why How Do You Know seems to be on the losing end of the 2010 holiday films tsunami. For all its witty delights and clever repartee – Brooks’ characters always unerringly say the best possible things, at the best possible moments – the result sometimes feels a bit too slick, a bit too formulaic, a bit too clever for its own good. Much as we come to enjoy our time spent with Lisa (Reese Witherspoon), George (Paul Rudd) and Matty (Owen Wilson), the set-up is contrived and the execution rather retro: It’s not hard to imagine these lines being delivered by the likes of, say, Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell, back in the day.

Mind you, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. But it does require a particular mindset: a willingness to go with the flow in order to enjoy what frequently feels more like a particularly nimble stage play.

Lisa has played ball her whole life; indeed, her entire soul is wrapped up in the game. But advancing age – a heart-stopping 31 – has robbed her of those necessary precious seconds of additional speed and swift reflexes. As this saga begins, she’s hit with the worst possible calamity: She’s cut from the USA Women’s softball team.

Cast adrift. Directionless. Without a clue what to do next.

Oh, sure; Lisa knew, intellectually, that this day would come. She simply didn’t expect it to come now. Her plight – and Witherspoon’s nuanced depiction of Lisa’s reaction – will feel familiar to anybody downsized during our ongoing economic malaise. It’s like being in a relationship that one knows won’t go the distance: We always want to leave on our terms, rather than wake up one morning to discover we’ve been left.

Dinner for Schmucks: Overcooked

Dinner for Schmucks (2010) • View trailer for Dinner for Schmucks
Three stars (out of five). Rating: PG-13, and somewhat generously, for sexual candor, partial nudity and considerable smutty content
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.5.10
Buy DVD: Dinner for Schmucks • Buy Blu-Ray: Dinner for Schmucks [Blu-ray]

American remakes of French comedies generally don't work very well, although that doesn't stop Hollywood from trying. 

Tinseltown studio execs love to extol rare successes such as The Birdcage (from La Cage Aux Folles) and Three Men and a Baby (Trois Hommes et un Couffin), conveniently forgetting that every hit stands in the far larger shadow of numerous train wrecks: The Toy (Le Jouet), Buddy, Buddy (L'emmerdeur), The Man with One Red Shoe (Le Grand Blond avec une Chaussure Noire), Just Visiting (Les Visiteurs), My Father, the Hero (Mon Pere, ce Heros), Pure Luck (Le Chevre), Jungle 2 Jungle (Un Indien dans la Ville) and The Man Who Loved Women (Franois Truffaut's L'homme Qui Aimait les Femmes, no less), among many others. 

In desperate need of a total boob to bring as a guest to his boss' cruel dinner
party, Tim (Paul Rudd) bumps into Barry (Steve Carell), a mousy IRS agent
who can't wait to share his unusual hobby: "mouse-terpiece" tableaus that
feature tiny stuffed rodents wearing itty-bitty human outfits. Yes, that's "The
Last Supper," and the astonished Tim is holding Jesus himself.

Honestly, the list is endless. 

Part of the problem is scale: American directors can't resist the compulsion to make a small joke large, a large joke massive, and a massive joke elephantine. If destroying a chair is funny, then destroying an entire apartment building must be even funnier. (Well ... no.) All sense of proportion is lost, and the scene's humor is sacrificed to bombast. 

The most awkward efforts, though, involve a sexual element: always a major mistake. The French handle sensuality and casual infidelity far differently than we do; their playful je ne sais quoi makes such movies erotic and droll, whereas American translations inevitably feel awkward, forced and vulgar. 

So: When American director Jay Roach focuses on the central relationship between Barry (Steve Carell) and Tim (Paul Rudd), Dinner for Schmucks stays on solid ground and is both funny and unexpectedly poignant. Credit Carell for the latter; he can go from unabashedly goofy to morosely vulnerable in the blink of an eye. 

But when Roach and screenwriters David Guion and Michael Handelman stray into the sexier territory inhabited with cheerful inhibition by Francis Veber's Le Diner de Cons, which inspired this film, the results fall as flat as the proverbial pancake. Great chunks of Dinner for Schmucks — those involving a hedonistic photographer/artist (Jemaine Clement, as Kieran) and Barry's grasping, sex-crazed, long-ago one-night stand (Lucy Punch, as Darla) — land with thuds that reverberate for miles. 

Both Clement and Punch are given impossible dialogue and thrust into stupidly contrived situations; Kieran's conversations about goats could win the annual Bulwer-Lytton Award for bad writing. 

Role Models: Model misbehavior

Role Models (2008) • View trailer for Role Models
2.5 stars (out of five). Rating: R, for smutty sexual content, nudity and relentless profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.13.08
Buy DVD: Role Models • Buy Blu-Ray: Role Models [Blu-ray]


Try as they might, some actors just aren't meant to be stars.

Paul Rudd is one of them.

He might best be remembered for his semi-regular gigs on TV's Friends and Reno 911, or his supporting performances in high-profile comedies such as Night at the Museum and The 40-Year-Old Virgin.

Would you want these two clowns spending time with your kids? Rather than
endure a 30-day stint in the slammer, Danny (Paul Rudd, center left) and
Wheeler (Seann William Scott, center right) agree to participate in a mentoring
program; they wind up assigned to, respectively, a geeky teen named Augie
(Christopher Mintz-Plasse, left) and an aggressively foul-mouthed fifth-grader
named Ronnie (Bobb'E J. Thompson). Rudd's morose expression in this photo
pretty much sums up the film's entire mood.

Rudd is not, however, leading man material.

He very nearly sinks Role Models, but in fairness this half-hearted comedy doesn't represent impressive effort on anybody's part, from its largely listless cast to David Wain's apparently disinterested direction.

Even the usually irrepressible Seann William Scott, such a hoot in the American Pie series, can't do more than muster up a pale imitation of his randy character from those films.

The script is credited to Rudd, Wain, Ken Marino, Timothy Dowling and William Blake Herron ... which is at least two names too many, and a certain sign that the finished product has been re-tweaked beyond any hope of salvation.

And it'd be a total loss were it not for the presence of — are you ready for the irony? — its two supporting players.

Both Christopher Mintz-Plasse and young Bobb'E J. Thompson are a hoot 'n' a holler: far funnier and much more interesting than Rudd and Scott. Mintz-Plasse and Thompson also are much better actors, and the latter's only 10 years old.

Rudd and Scott star as Danny and Wheeler, two frontmen for Minotaur energy drinks. Wheeler, with minimal career goals, has a great time dressing up as the company's minotaur mascot during the countless "Don't do drugs" school assemblies that fill their days. Danny, on the other hand, views his 10 years with the company as a sign that his life has gone nowhere.

Danny's increased self-loathing finally poisons his seven-year relationship with girlfriend Beth (Elizabeth Banks), who dumps him.

With this as a catalyst, Danny drags Wheeler into an "incident" with the Minotaur company truck; the result is a sentence of 150 hours of community service in a mentorship program called Sturdy Wings, clearly modeled after Big Brother.