Wednesday, January 02, 2008

Three Movies I saw

During my days off, I saw some movies...

Juno: Occasionally you wander into a movie and realize that the movies aimed at the hip, the young, the with-it, the tastemakers... are no longer aimed at you. And that movie has unintentionally informed you that you are either too old, too unhip or too cynical to enjoy the movie in the way it was meant to be watched.

People love this movie. I thought it was okay, but I don't really get why people are falling over each other to praise the flick. At best, it seems like a good starter vehicle for star Ellen Page.

I found the dialog oddly stilted and stylized for a fairly concrete sort of movie, and I was sort of having trouble buying the hipper-than-thou'ness of the lead character and references that seemed to place the movie about ten to fifteen years ago. Toss in a nigh-lack of consequence for the lead characters, and a somewhat insidious cry for conformity, and the movie just didn't work for me.

Walk Hard: Is Exactly what you think it is. Only a little less funny. I do wonder if it would be funnier on a second viewing as the movie is terribly quotable. Unfortunately, in spoofing a film like "Walk the Line", the characters need to follow the same path as the late, great, screwed up Johnny Cash, you have to pretty much follow the many beats of the source material. This makes the movie seem a bit bogged down, and occasionally those familiar with Walk the Line or Cash's bio may not find much humor in scenes as they're played.

A renter for a boring Friday night, I'd say.

And, I know I am alone in this, but I think Tim Meadows is one of the most under-appreciated comedians on TV or film. That guy cracks me up. And, yes, I have both seen and ENJOYED The Ladies Man.

I am Legend: If Juno was not aimed at me, I am Legend is pretty squarely targeting me directly. Part action movie, part character piece, part Zombie flick, and featuring explosions and the affable Will Smith, they might as well have written "with The League in mind" right on the poster.

That said, the movie left too many gaps that I filled in from viewings of The Omega Man, but successfully changed the "mutants" into something far more frightening than the albino goobers of Omega Man.

Still, one feels that the movie seemed like it could have been larger in scope somehow, and that the movie seems too often like its trying to get you to jump and too seldom like there's much past the spookiness in the shadows.

Probably worth seeing in a dark theater at matinee. Or go rent Omega Man for an ending that has a really grim downer before the credits, the kind that you just don't get any more thanks to the suits wanting to offer the audience either hope or a chance of a sequel.

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