No Hard Feelings: Not so sure about that

No Hard Feelings (2023) • View trailer

Three stars (out of five). Rated R, for sexual content, graphic nudity, brief drug use and relentless profanity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 6.23.23

Director Gene Stupnitsky’s bawdy entry can’t decide what it wants to be.

 

At times, it displays the energetic, no-holds-barred raunch typical of classics such as The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Bridesmaids and There’s Something About Mary. A scrappy beach fight scene here is the stuff of cinema legend.

 

After an enjoyable day at the local boardwalk, Maddie (Jennifer Lawrence) is
delighted by the prize that Percy (Andrew Barth Feldman) has won for her.

But at other times we’re expected to empathize with the two primary characters as authentic people, with credible feelings and angst.

It’s almost impossible to achieve both goals; the former too frequently undercuts the latter … particularly given the mean-spiritedness of Stupnitsky and John Phillips’ script. The line between funny and cruel is very thin, and this film too frequently slides onto the wrong side.

 

Maddie Barker (Jennifer Lawrence), a longtime resident of the Long Island village of Montauk, is appalled by how incoming rich jerks have transformed her community. Rising property taxes are threatening the house in which she grew up, and which holds the memory of her late mother. Maddie’s jobs as bar maid and Uber driver no longer keep up with the bills, and — as this story begins — her car is repossessed by former short-term lover Gary (Ebon Moss-Bachrach).

 

Now reduced to getting around on roller skates, and lacking the additional Uber income, the situation rapidly becomes even more dire. Then Maddie is alerted to an unusual Craigslist job listing from wealthy helicopter parents seeking somebody to “date” their introverted 19-year-old son, and bring him out of his shell before he leaves for Princeton in the fall. The payment: a free Buick Regal.

 

The quotation marks around the word “date” are telling.

 

Although the set-up smells uncomfortably like pimping, Maddie is desperate … and pragmatic; her love life has been limited to a long string a short-timers and one-night stands. How different could this be?

 

She therefore arranges to meet Laird and Allison Becker (Matthew Broderick and Laura Benanti, both deadpan hilarious), who live in a cluelessly privileged world. Their son, Percy (Andrew Barth Feldman), has no friends, rarely leaves his room, and hasn’t learned to drive; his parents worry that Princeton will eat him alive.

 

Although their ad specified a woman in her “young 20s,” Maddie argues that her 32-year-old self is guaranteed to be “more sensitive” to the situation. (Lawrence is indeed 32.) Laird and Allison accept this rationale, and caution that Percy must never know about the arrangement. (Well, no kidding.) They explain that he volunteers at a local animal shelter, and suggest that Maddie visit as a potential dog adopter.

 

At which point, this film goes off the rails for the first time (and certainly not the last).

The Little Things: A big mistake

The Little Things (2021) • View trailer

Two stars. Rated R, for violence, disturbing images, nudity and profanity

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 2.26.21 

You don’t often see three Oscar winners starring in the same film.

 

Too bad they’re so ill-served by this inept crime drama.

 

Looking to show off in front of visiting veteran detective Joe "Deke" Deacon (Denzel
Washington, center rear), homicide Det. Jim Baxter (Rami Malek) browbeats a junior
officer, while Det. Jamie Estrada (Natalie Morales) watches nervously.

The Little Things, exclusive to HBO Max, benefits from the participation of Denzel Washington and Rami Malek, both of whom bring far more to the table than writer/director John Lee Hancock deserves.

 

In fairness, Hancock can be a talented director. He guided Sandra Bullock to an Academy Award in 2009’s The Blind Side, and I thoroughly enjoyed how he handled Kevin Costner and Woody Harrelson, in 2019’s The Highwaymen.

 

But as a writer, he record is spotty at best; his best efforts are adaptations of existing books, as with The Blind Side and 1997’s Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. He certainly has no flair for concocting a psychological crime thriller such as this one, which repeatedly screams for the superior touch of a seasoned mystery author.

 

As Clint Eastwood’s Harry Callahan observes, in 1973’s Magnum Force, “A man’s got to know his limitations.”

 

Hancock obviously doesn’t.

 

The year is 1990, likely to avoid the intrusion of cell phones, social media and DNA evidence. Kern County Sheriff’s Deputy Joe “Deke” Deacon (Washington) is sent down to Los Angeles, for what should be a quick evidence-gathering assignment. He runs afoul of preppy L.A. County Sheriff’s Homicide Department Sgt. Jim Baxter (Malek), whose “college boy” condescension provokes little more than an amused smile from Deke.

 

Washington delivers it with quiet élan. Actually, pretty much everything Washington does, emerges with elegance and dignity.

 

Turns out Deke has “history” with this Los Angeles department, having departed under something of a cloud. (Hancock shares these details via maddeningly sparse and fleeting flashbacks, as the film proceeds.) Deke left behind a few friends — Det. Sal Rizoli (Chris Bauer), and L.A. coroner’s assistant Flo Dunigan (Michael Hyatt) — but most other department stalwarts were happy to see the back of him.

 

Baxter heads the task force charged with tracking down a serial killer who has been doing nasty things to attractive young women. Perhaps as a passive/aggressive means of showing up the old-timer, Baxter invites Deke along to a fresh crime scene, where the newest victim has just been discovered. This ploy fails, forcing Baxter to reluctantly admire Deke’s methodical analysis and careful eye for “the little things.”

 

The two men begin an initially prickly — but soon mutually respectful — partnership.

 

Because, as it turns out, the details of this current murder spree have uncanny similarities to the equally morbid serial killer case that Deke obsessively pursued, back in the day: to the cost of his health, his marriage and his job.

 

Stuber: Stoo-pid

Stuber (2019) • View trailer 
Two stars. Rated R, for relentless violence and profanity, sexual candor, and fleeting nudity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.12.19

Good grief.

I haven’t seen this much contrived, gratuitous and pointless destruction of property since the inane Disney comedies of the 1960s, when a bear would “accidentally” stumble into somebody’s garage and wreak havoc with scores of spilled paint cans.

Stu (Kumail Nanjiani, right) objects strongly when Vic (Dave Bautista) insists on giving a
ride to a dog they've just rescued. Stu should be more tolerant; this pooch is far more
entertaining than most of the rest of the film.

The bear in this case is Dave Bautista’s Vic Manning, a rogue cop with serious anger issues, thanks to a violent, over-the-top prologue dominated by his protracted, dog-nuts fight with gleefully sadistic bad guy Oka Tedjo (Iko Uwais). Alas, the villain gets away, fueling Vic’s rage during six subsequent months of frustrating, futile investigations.

Director Michael Dowse’s Stuber is one of the most uneven action flicks ever unleashed by Hollywood: at times genuinely funny — mostly when Bautista’s hulking Vic trades verbal barbs with Kumail Nanjiani’s meek and mild Stu — and then atrociously violent and/or needlessly vulgar. 

Dowse doesn’t have the faintest idea what sort of movie he’s making, which is no surprise; Tripper Clancy’s clumsy excuse for a script doesn’t give anybody much to work with. Absent Bautista and Nanjiani’s inherent timing and camera presence, this flick would be a total bomb.

Which is a shame. Bautista and Nanjiani aside, Dowse’s lame effort also wastes the time and talent of solid co-stars Natalie Morales, Karen Gillan and Mira Sorvino. This is an abysmally stupid movie, and Clancy’s script is strictly from hunger.

The result is the sort of tasteless, mean-spirited mess that delights in introducing innocent civilians who hang around long enough to make an impression, before being needlessly snuffed.

On top of which, the publicity campaign is quite misleading. The lovably slobbering dog featured so prominently on the poster art has two fleeting scenes, and plays no part in the action.

Battle of the Sexes: A match made in heaven

Battle of the Sexes (2017) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated PG-13, for sexual content and brief nudity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 9.29.17

An estimated 90 million people around the world parked in front of TV sets on Sept. 20, 1973, in order to watch what became a defining moment in sports, American culture and — most particularly — the rising momentum for women’s equality.

When she agrees to the challenge issued by Bobby Riggs (Steve Carell), Billy Jean King
(Emma Stone) also gamely endures the media circus that precedes the historic event.

At the same time, the so-called “Battle of the Sexes” was pure circus.

On top of which, one of the participants was struggling with sexual identity, at a time when such matters scarcely were tolerated in this country, let alone allowed to go public.

That’s a lot of baggage for a single two-hour film to handle, and its success is a tribute to pedigree: Co-directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris (Little Miss Sunshine, Ruby Sparks), along with Academy Award-winning scripter Simon Beaufoy (Slumdog Millionaire), have concocted a thoughtful, perceptive and thoroughly entertaining dramedy that blends tender romance, historical context and an undercurrent of sly outrage over the degree of unapologetic chauvinism that was fashionable a mere four decades ago.

Add two stars who skillfully adopt the identities of their real-world counterparts — to a frequently spooky degree — and the result is quite engaging.

The story begins in 1971, as Billie Jean King (Emma Stone) and good friend Gladys Heldman (Sarah Silverman) — a hard-nosed PR and tennis maven — confront longtime tennis promoter Jack Kramer (Bill Pullman) over the insulting disparity between the financial prizes earned by male and female champions. Kramer holds firm with the prevailing view that women aren’t “worth” parity.

In response, King and Heldman — with considerable assistance from King’s husband, Larry (Austin Stowell) — form their own nascent women’s league (which, within a few years, would become the Women’s Tennis Association). It’s a gutsy move, since Kramer immediately expels them from the U.S. Lawn Tennis Association. The players — which include King, Margaret Court (Jessica McNamee), Rosie Casals (Natalie Morales) and half a dozen others — nonetheless adopt a spunky guerrilla spirit, booking their own venues, posting promotional banners, and selling their own tickets.

Matters improve when the group receives full sponsorship from Philip Morris, for what becomes known as the Virginia Slims Tour.

Meanwhile, Bobby Riggs (Steve Carell), decades removed from his professional championships in the 1940s, frets over his own obsolescence. He chafes behind a useless desk job, supported by a wealthy wife, Priscilla (Elisabeth Shue), who is losing her tolerance for his chronic gambling habit. But as a longtime hustler and media-savvy opportunist, Riggs smells publicity after learning what King and her cohorts are up to.

And so comes the challenge, from the man who proudly promises to keep the “show” in chauvinism.