A Word To The Wise… The Jackanory

Baking can be methodical, measured and timely, an easy distraction from the doldrums of everyday life. For Jenna (Keri Russell) creating a new pie provides a sense of calm and catharsis that’s missing in her personal life. The love and sense of fun she’s never felt for her own husband is redirected into her work, the one aspect she seems to have any control over.
Writer and director Adrienne Shelly creates a bittersweet screwball comedy, with equal measures of love and loneliness. It’s entirely familiar but never trite or derivative, illustrating how far Shelly could have developed were it not for her murder just before the film’s opening at Sundance.

When I say that this is familiar, it’s because the roadside diner and pie shop in which Russell’s Jenna inhabits could easily house any sitcom cast, with it’s curmudgeon owner (played to perfection by Andy Griffith), bitter manager and unusual visitors. The other waitresses, loveless and lonely Dawn (Shelly again) and Becky (Cheryl Hines reveling in not having to be the straight man to Larry David for once) provide warmth and support, yet would never take Earl (Jeremy Sisto), Jenna’s husband and propagator of her woes. When Jenna discovers that she’s pregnant, despite abortion never being an option for her personally, she’s terrified of telling him: concerns that are certainly justified as Earl’s only concern upon finding out is whether or not she’ll still love him more than the baby (ironic considering it’s the only thing hampering her escape). Inadvertadly, she begins an affair with her obstetrician (Nathan Fillion), a twitchy and awkward man that immediately sows confusion within Jenna’s world.

The honesty and supreme lack of ceremony and apology associated with the affair is not only a testament to both Russell and Fillion’s likability but indicative of the movie as a whole. The mix of screwball and sentiment is never completely outside of what is reasonable, toeing the line on plausibility; the hyperbolized Americana evident throughout where perseverance is admired is often slightly ridiculous but never incredulous. Perhaps the only letdown is Griffith who acts as a Deus Ex Machina, allowing for a clean resolution that perhaps could have been handled by Jenna herself rather than through an external force, meaning that the changes brought about aren’t best realised.

Infused with warm life from the beginning, ‘Waitress’ is a fitting end to a life cut short by a promising writer, director and actress capable of making us feel good where it shouldn’t necessarily do so.

Most people hate flying, the idea of being trapped in a flying phallic-shaped tube with recirculated air for several hours isn’t something that gets many excited. Unless of course you’re Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) who tries to spend as little time at home as possible.

Believing and even projecting his philosophy his having no “baggage” like family, friends or a home to anyone who’ll listen is perhaps the embodiment of that. Bingham is a corporate assassin, flying from city to city firing staff for those who can’t do it themselves however he tries to see himself as helping those at their weakest moment make the transition into unemployment; with the new downturn, Craig Gregory (Jason Bateman), Bingham’s unctuous employer suggest grounding him permanently in favour of using computers to increase efficiency.

Reitman, the director of Juno and Thank You For Smoking is clearly a fan of using simplicity as his narrative device, often employing montages of Bingham packing his suitcase with a zeal and efficiency that both he and the character seem to revel in but ultimately tell us little. These visual devices tell us much about Bingham’s professional life but little about him, something Reitman’s phrasing and writing conflicts with at every turn. This wouldn’t be an issue except for the dialogue often being clunky and very much like a self help book in need of teaching the characters lessons and one dimensional in nature. Such lessons are further at odds with the acting, inorganic and forced when the twists and turns come about.
Even the irony of a man who dismisses staff at the behest of others but complains about the mechanisation of the same is never looked at to a material degree, a sentiment that goes to the heart of the other themes as well.

Clooney iterates at length that he is never alone when he’s travelling and that the people he meets really know him but the very idea is childlike. For a man who revels in being alone, he craves human interaction, evident even in his choice of work where he sees himself as more of a counselor than vulture. One of the few scenes involving him at home illustrates his lust for company, even the acknowledgement he requests upon check-in highlights this constant need for validation. As a result, he has become obsessed with achieving air miles and status within this world he has created, something that to him will give his life meaning. Despite all the charm and vulnerability he injects into the story, it’s impossible to ignore how he is lying to himself, making everything that happens rather formulaic and predictable; he may argue that we all die alone and even believe it but tries his best to leave his mark in whatever way he can.

Alex (Vera Farmiga) and Natalie (Anna Kendrick) attempt to best Bingham, something Farmiga often achieves but cannot maintain due to poor character development; she fleets in and out of the story, bringing out the warmth and vulnerability in the central character before an artificially inserted twist (which doesn’t entirely fit with her characterisation) removes her entirely. Kendrick on the other hand, is like a juvenile pandora’s box, incapable of feeling emotion without immediately expressing it, often for comedic effect. However she does not have the timing or flare required for comedy, meaning it is often awkward and calculated in appearance. The effect they have on Bingham is their greatest contribution and the best result of the piece overall but cannot undo the structural issues that’s palpable in every scene.

Obsessed with status and the look and feel, Up In The Air is an interesting observation of the characters it highlights, but falls far short of actually examining them to any significant degree. Superficial to the last, it’s a shame that we had to watch from afar rather than from the cast’s point of view.

I’m really starting to dislike Meryl Streep and her recent change of direction in acting roles. Once known for her dramatic character acting, even she seemed aware that she was never going to be sexy, being far too self-aware and calculated in her movements for that to every be a viable option. She has never even possessed the ability to fully assimilate herself into a role, the running gag for me personally, being that it will be Streep you notice first and the role second. So what drove her to engage in this recent spat of comedic roles, especially in such mind numbing drivel as Julie & Julia, which she’s now won a Golden Globe for? These same hinderances are something that kills any humour.

The plot centres on Julie Powell (played by a rather unstable Amy Adams) who is about to turn 30, a writer who can’t get her manuscript published and who handles calls from victims of the 9/11 attacks, along with those who simply don’t agree with plans to rebuild the towers. Believing that she must finish something, she creates a blog with the goal of cooking every recipe from Julia Child’s Mastering The Art of French Cooking within a year. Woven within this is the story of Julia herself (awkwardly portrayed by Streep) and her beginnings as a chef in Paris and how her book came to be published.

There exists nothing particularly interesting or even conventional within the script, with this becoming a story solely about Childs with Powell (and Adams as a result), becoming a nervous wreck, seeking to emulate a character who appears to be nothing more than a caricature; what an American audience would expect the beloved chef to be in real life. Powell’s inclusion appears nothing more than a cheap ploy to attract an audience unfamiliar with Childs and attach even more unnecessary reverence to her. Even the simple inclusion of both being in happy marriages means that the story cannot fit into a conventional romantic comedy format and as a result, the movie scrapes for any sense of drama or progression, so much so that the actual reaction of the chef to the young writer is left until the movies final moments and goes uncharacteristically ignored.

The acting is equally as schizophrenic with Meryl’s self awareness adding a forced quality to everything she does, only her husband played my Stanley Tucci appears to act naturally out of the entire period cast. Everything is far too calculated and thought out to be in any way funny. The caricature she embodies is made obvious when a Saturday Night Live skit of Dan Aykroyd portraying Child is no more ludicrous than Streep’s portrayal.
Adams as Powell is nothing short of worrying in how she is written or (according to the script) truthfully played, so much so that a 90 year old Child should have considered a barring order. She explains everything good that happens to her as being a result of Child (perhaps somewhat true as, if you listen to her writing her blog posts she shows no aptitude for writing in the slightest). She snaps and bickers with her doormat of a husband for no apparent reason and mimics the feelings and experiences of Childs like a Twilight fan does Bella.

Adams decision to be involved at all in this bloated piece can at least be explained away by saying that she wanted to be involved in a Streep movie or hopes to break into the romantic comedy market. However, there is only one reasonable explanation for Streep taking such roles that springs to mind; no matter how awful the movie (and that even includes Mamma Mia where none of the cast could either sing or dance and the story might as well have been written in crayon), she knows that people will continue to nominate her for awards and give her positive feedback. Thus the joke is perhaps firmly on us.

“See It Now”, both the name of the show within the show and the sentiment I have of this piece which revisits a time where the Health Service had not realised the dangers of smoking inside a busy pub on a Friday night. Whereas ‘Mad Men’ creates lush colour palettes and moral uncertainty, George Clooney’s second foray into directing (after ‘Confessions of a Dangerous Mind’ which similarly examined the life of a man involved in television) uses monotone black and white effect and a sultry jazz soundtrack to hlighlight the potential ramifications of true journalistic integrity.

This resolve is embodied in Edward Murrow (David Strathairn) who in the 40s and 50s fought Senator McCarthy for his unruly methods in hunting down communists during the height of the Cold War. A wonderful irony is provided in how footage of McCarthy is used to represent him here, illustrating how this still fledgling industry could fight political propaganda as much incite it.

Clooney and his team show a level of comfort with television that’s palpable, allowing the surface level story to occupy the black and white with every subtlety and nuance within an ever larger grey area. With the build up to the broadcast of the most damaging allegations against McCarthy, we see paranoia and politics operate on every level; Don Hollenbeck (Ray Wise), a fellow news anchor commits suicide after being attack by a tabloid columnist; Joe and Shirley (Robert Downey Jr and Patricia Clarkson) worry about the potential ramifications of the exposé on their marriage in an office which bans fraternisation; and manager Willam Paley’s (Frank Langella) battle to support the needs of a free press and a palpable democracy in such uncertain times against satisfying the bottom line and keeping sponsors happy.

The scenes between Strathairn and Langella are perhaps the best within the entire piece, with the latter as Paley providing a much more interesting foil, providing the crew with the smoking gun that inevitably leads to their commercial fall from grace.

With editing that only further heightens the sense of immediacy and never cajoles or condescends to the audience, Clooney allows the piece to speak for itself, taking a supporting but almost invisible role within the piece, a testament to both his potential modesty and self-assuredness. Based on the results, he has a long career ahead of him in front of and behind the camera.

Or should I say Avatar: Part II? Well, at least there’s one thing this hyper-stylized thriller gives us and that’s vampires who don’t enter a murderous rage after some heavy petting.

Centering itself on a world where vampires have become the new black, humans are rounded up like cattle to feed their yellow eyed overloads; as a result, blood supplies are running low and it is up to Edward (Ethan Hawke harnessing his full powers of brooding and sullenness) to develop a blood substitute. Meeting a group of renegade humans (populated by the former casts of Home & Away and The Secret Lives of Us), Edward discovers that their leader Elvis (Willem Defoe) holds the key to a potential cure and return to humanity.
Sam Neill hovers ominously overhead as Edward’s malevolent benefactor, cementing it’s post-apocalyptic credentials (and proving that along with William H Macy, he’ll do anything for a paycheck).

The plot for all its intentions, remains little more than an irritation, getting in the way of the sudden jolts the directors produce with wanton glee and enthusiasm. There is no character development, with each character essentially ending the movie with the same level of depth with which they entered it. Characters are introduced, only to serve a purpose and meet their eventual end, whether it be violent or simple redundancy.

A significant amount of time is given over to establishing imagery and analogies to real life situations such as food shortages, corporate greed and simple ethical egoism but are handled with such force that it’s like trying to force a round peg into a square hole; using C4 explosives.

Where the movie truly shines is in its aesthetics, being both beautifully captured and developed. In spite of its faults, it somehow manages to still evoke a sense of foreboding and end of days physicality that is rarely seen elsewhere. Perhaps best watched without sound, the feel and visuals outlive the actual message of the script and make it a quite enjoyable piece to watch.

Based on the beloved character, Guy Ritchie (ex Mr. Madonna) attempts to update Sherlock Holmes for the masses; more surprisingly, for the most part he succeeds.
From the very beginning we are shown how Holmes (Robert Downey Jr.) is capable of extreme incites, able to dissect how to incapacitate a guard in slow motion before we see it realised with grunts and whacks included. Such a thing would not be unthinkable of Ritchie but we learn that this faculty of the great detective is indeed more akin to a curse; acts that no one else would pick up on haunting him in an inaudible chorus that only further cultivates his eccentricities (and allows Downey Jr. to be at his best). Cared for by his roommate Watson (Jude Law acting uncharacteristically charming), they must unravel a plan that’s so busy and frantic that it ends up being largely as uninteresting as the Dan Brown novels it borrows from, with its secret societies and menacing aristocracy (played best by Mark Strong though there are many).

Thus the central conceit is the director’s personal philosophy – “be cool”. Although it works beautifully with Ritchie’s London, a steampunk period visual feast, best highlighted by how the city is used in the course of the duo’s scrapes and follies. Regardless, it can often feel too “clever” for it’s own good, with Holme’s foibles pushed to the Nth degree and often spiraling off without any explanation, convoluting an already haphazard script.

What rescues the piece are Downey Jr. and Law, turning Holmes and Watson into a Butch Cassidy and Sundance for a new generation; both acting as foils for the other and evidently enjoying every minute of it, something that is always palpable and give us the best moments in this two hour long behemoth. Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams) seems almost artificially implanted into the story, most suggesting it as a beard for the homoerotic subtext but if simply having a male friend who you love in the modern sense of platonic love is gay then we really need to re-examine how obsessed with sex we are as a culture. Adler appears to serve only a plot device and introduction to Professor Moriarty, McAdams tries (and occasionally succeeds) in breathing life into her but with so little screen time and character development the conflict between whether or not she is gritty or ethereal never resolves itself.

Overall, Holmes is an interesting and worthwhile addition to the franchise but some restraint is needed in script and direction, something that should be considered if a sequel is to come.

And don’t expect that the Baker Street Irregulars are clamouring to see it either…