Everyone is buzzing about Tarantino’s new movie Inglourious Basterds, which opens today, but I don’t know about this one. Although a lot of people automatically bow down to Tarantino’s “genius”, his films are always hit or miss with me. I don’t know if I could handle sitting through all 153 minutes of this movie in a theater. Maybe I better wait for this one on DVD. No doubt it’ll be the No. 1 film at the box office this weekend, though:
Edit: Well, I guess the clip was removed for some reason.
Plot summary (with possible spoilers): At the age of 11, Anna Fitzgerald (played by Abigail Breslin) has decided that to sue her parents Sara (Cameron Diaz) and Brian (Jason Patric) for medical emancipation. Conceived by artificial means, Anna knows from the start that the only reason she is even on the planet is to be a donor for her sister Kate (Sofia Vassilieva), who is dying of leukemia.
Anna has been donating marrow, blood, plasma, you name it, to Kate for years. But now Kate needs a kidney, and this is where Anna draws the line. She wants to be able to lead a normal life, play soccer, be a cheerleader, do all the normal, active things that kids do. But that won’t happen if she’s forced to give up a kidney for Kate. So even though Anna is the only match, she goes to attorney Campbell Alexander (Alec Baldwin) to sue for medical emancipation. He agrees to take the case.
Meanwhile, Brian, and especially Sara, can’t figure out why Anna would suddenly refuse to help Kate. After all, Anna loves Kate, and would ordinarily do anything for her big sis. So what has gotten into her?
Through a series of flashbacks, the history of Kate’s illness is revealed, showing what a huge strain it has been on all of their lives. Along the way, viewers come to understand Kate’s relationship with her family a bit better, and also to discover what Anna’s true motivation is.
My Reaction: I know that My Sister’s Keeper was based on a Jodi Picoult novel of the same name, but since I haven’t read the novel, I can only discuss the film. Frankly, I was disappointed with it.
For one thing, it was clear almost from the start what was really going on with Anna, so that just made for a pretty boring wait until the “reveal” happened on screen. The filmmakers went out of their way to show how much Anna and Kate loved each other, so there could only be one possible reason Anna would refuse to want to give her kidney to Kate. As a result, all the courtroom stuff just dragged the film down and slowed the story almost to a complete standstill.
Another reason I didn’t like this film was that Sara seemed like such a complete and utter bitch. I don’t know, maybe having one of your kids dying from cancer makes you completely neglect the two living ones and your husband. Maybe that’s a natural reaction and Sara wasn’t to be blamed. But to me she just seemed like such an unpleasant person that I could barely watch while she was on screen.
And this is going to sound terrible, but I couldn’t stand to see Sofia Vassilieva on screen, either. Again, wading into the shallow end of the pool here, but whatever: there was something odd going on with her teeth, so whenever she smiled I was just distracted beyond measure. Yes, I feel weird saying this about a 16-year-old, but eww… she was kinda ugly, and having to shave her head for the role made things 100 times worse.
Overall, I thought My Sister’s Keeper was just an average film. It was hampered by a predictable storyline and poor performances, so what should have been a powerful, emotional tale turned into little more than schlocky melodrama. I give it 2 stars out of 5.
The Season 3 premiere of Burn Notice was called “Friends and Family”, and naturally picked up from where S2 ended. Specifically, Michael just swam the five miles to shore after jumping out of management’s helicopter — and within minutes had cops chasing after him. Fiona convinces him to just turn himself in, so he spends some time in lockup before an old friend named Harlan comes to bail him out.
Odd Job of the Week: Harlan’s girlfriend Marta has had her home and land seized by a ruthless crime boss named Cortez. Cortez just moves in on properties owned by weak people, takes over, and resells them to the highest bidder. Marta’s father was thrown in jail for trying to stand up to Cortez, and since he’s sick and all, Marta is worried he might die in there. She begs Michael to help Harlan get him out.
So Harlan and Mike go to work on trying to meet with Cortez in person. This proves to be extremely difficult, as he doesn’t take any security risks. But Mike eventually gets the job done — only to have Harlan double-cross him in the end. There’s no way a schmuck like Harlan is going to get the best of Mike for long, though, so don’t worry about that.
Burn notice progress: There wasn’t much in the way of actual progress this week. Michael just realized that Management wasn’t kidding around about the protection stuff. As soon as they backed off, all Michael’s name started appearing in databases and enemies started crawling out of the woodwork. Mike is not going to give in, though. In fact, he thinks he’ll eventually be able to get his old job back.
Character development: Fiona and Michael appear to be off again, as he admitted he can’t give her all the attention she deserves. Sam is proving to be a solid friend (I can’t believe he used to inform on Mike to the FBI) who’s got Michael’s back no matter what. And Madeline thinks these three need to stick together. For sure!
My Reaction: Well, it was kind of a boring episode overall, but I understand they’re just setting the stage for the rest of Season 3. I wonder how things will play out now that Michael has no protection of any kind. The weekly enemies are bound to be much more dangerous now.
Robin Wright has filed for divorce from Sean Penn — again. This is the third time the couple has begun divorce proceedings (the each filed once before), and this time Wright claims it’s for real. According to that EW article I linked to, the couple has already worked out custody arrangements for 16-year-old son Jack and divided up their property.
Who knows what goes on behind closed doors, right? These two have been together since 1989, have been married since 1996, so they obviously have a lot of history together. But three divorce filings since 2007 showed that their relationship was pretty much doomed.
BTW, I just wanted to mention that I’ve loved Robin Wright ever since she played Kelly Capwell on that old soap Santa Barbara. Anyone else remember that?? And she was in my favorite movie of all-time, Forrest Gump, so I’ve gotta give her props for that as well.
Here’s hoping she achieves some peace and happiness out of all this!
Entourage 6×06 — “Murphy’s Lie”: Well, after a pretty entertaining episode last week, Entourage was back with another boring offer last night. The whole thing was about the various relationships on the show, with two of them — Eric & Ashley and Andrew & Lizzie — taking front and center despite the fact that they’re totally snooze-worthy. Ugh, I kept waiting for something good to happen, but it was all in vain. I’m just not sure what the point of this season is yet….
– OMG, every time Eric and Ashley are on the screen together, I simply tune out. They’re either fighting about something completely fucking stupid and high schoolish, or they’re making up about said fight. God, it’s so ridiculous. E is supposed to be 30 or something, right? And he’s the mature one of the gang, isn’t he? Well, start acting like it, please!
– Lizzie/Andrew/Andrew’s wife/Ari/Mrs.Ari…. just as totally pointless and boring, IMO. Again, I’m not sure why Andrew is getting so much screen time here. Is this the only storyline the writers could come up with for Ari this season? Has he even been in more than three scenes with Vince in these 6 episodes? Come on!
– Out of all the couples, Jamie and Turtle are the best because they seem to be the most normal. So of course the writers have to go and screw with them. Please don’t tell me they’re going to have her sleep with Coakley. That would just be so wrong.
– Another woman throws herself at Vince. What a surprise. What was up with that video camera, though? In this day and age of YouTube, Facebook, and TMZ, I can’t imagine any celeb letting some random hookup whip out a camera in bed. Lemme guess: the footage is going to be published online, the girl will turn out to be underage, and there will be career fallout for Vince. Then after a couple episodes of hand-wringing and worrying about the future, Ari will manage to spin it to make Vince look like a hero and things will go back to normal again. Am I close? Yawn.
The sci-fi thriller District 9 was a surprise hit at the box office, earning a whopping $37 million in its debut to unseat G.I. Joe as the No.1 film in America. This was a pretty impressive feat, especially considering the fact that District 9 is a South African movie peopled with relatively unknown actors. G.I. Joe, meanwhile, earned another $22.5 million in second place, bringing its 10-day total to $98.8 million.
Several other new releases made it into the top 10, including the Rachel McAdams-Eric Bana sci-fi romance The Time Traveler’s Wife. Based on the novel of the same name by Audrey Niffenegger, this film sold $19.2 million in tickets, putting it in third place overall.
The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard, starring Jeremy Piven, grossed $5.35 million, while master animator Hayao Miyazaki’s Ponyo earned $3.51 million in limited release.
Here’s the complete Top 10 at the box office for the weekend ending 8/16/09:
I know that My Name is Earl was canceled back in May, but I had all the Season 4 eps on TiVo still and just got around to watching them recently.
I have to say that even though S4 was a lot better than S3, I agree that it was time for the show to go. The formula was getting old and it just wasn’t as funny anymore. There are only so many times we can see Earl making up for stealing car or truck accessories back when he was a criminal, ya know?
The only thing I regret is that the creators didn’t get the cancellation notice a bit earlier. I hate it when a show doesn’t end properly, like MNIE. They were clearly expecting to come back for another season, but I guess it wasn’t meant to be. RIP, Camdenites!
I’m not all that big on animated films. I mean, I watch them and sometimes even enjoy them, but I never go out of my way to purchase the DVDs. In fact, the only animated feature I’ve ever owned was Beauty and the Beast — on VHS when it first came out nearly 20 years ago!
But that’s going to change soon, because today when I was browsing at Buy.com, I saw this My Neighbor Totoro 2-Disc Set that I would love to have. The film is by Miyazaki Hayao, who many people claim to be the best animator ever. His works are extremely popular in Japan, and My Neighbor Totoro (known in the original as となりのトトロ) is one of the most beloved children’s films of all-time.
This 2-disc set contains the full-length film (86 minutes), available with the original Japanese voice actors along with English subtitles and in a dubbed English version. Most Miyazaki fans prefer the Japanese voice actors with English subtitles, so this should be a major selling point for the set. There are also a couple of bonus features, including storyboards from the film, the original Japanese trailer, and interviews with the Fanning sisters (Dakota and Elle), who voiced Mei and Satsuki in the English version.
The My Neighbor Totoro 2-Disc set is currently on sale for $23.98, which is a pretty good deal — especially since I’ve seen just the one-disc edition selling for roughly the same price. I need to add this movie to my collection soon!
Horror is pretty much my least favorite genre, as it’s so difficult to get this kind of film right. I usually prefer stories that are scary because they actually could happen (like Silence of the Lambs) more than stories that are all about blood and gore (Nightmare on Elm Street, etc.) I typically don’t care for anything that makes heavy use of supernatural elements, but again, the result can be good when done the right way (think The Exorcist).
So when I heard about Mirrors, which is a horror film about haunted/possessed mirrors, I was very skeptical about how well the story would play out on screen. It was pretty much a given that I wouldn’t be scared because of the real-life possibilities of the plot, so that left it up to the actors to sell the film to me. Surprisingly enough, I thought they did a decent job!
Plot summary (with possible spoilers): Ben Carson (played by Kiefer Sutherland) is a NYPD detective who is on leave after being involved in a shooting. He has been off the force for a year alread, and in that time, his life has basically come apart. He’s had problems with alcohol, is still taking painkillers, and is estranged from wife Amy (Paula Patton) and children Michael (Cameron Boyce) and Daisy (Erica Gluck). He currently lives with his sister Angela (Amy Smart), and, in an effort to get back on his feet, has taken a job as a night security guard at the Mayflower department store, which is closed because of a fire.
One of the strangest characteristics of the Mayflower is that it’s full of mirrors, and all of the mirrors are spotless and polished. That’s because the previous night watchman, Gary Lewis (Josh Cole) was obsessed with keeping those things clean — until something drove him to slash his own throat with shards of glass from a subway bathroom mirror.
During Ben’s first night on the job, he notices something strange about the mirrors in the Mayflower. In them, he sees reflections of things that aren’t there. Moreover, all of the scenes show people being treated horribly or suffering from ghastly injuries. Ben doesn’t know what’s going on, but he’s compelled to do research. This leads to the discovery that the Mayflower used to be a mental hospital run by a less-than-ethical doctor who purposely mistreated patients.
Once the possessed being in the mirrors tries to go after Ben’s family, all bets are off. Kiefer kicks into full Jack Bauer mode to get to the bottom of the mystery and save his loved ones. This involves tracking down an old patient of the mental hospital who supposedly died but is actually still alive. Apparently, the mirrors have a score to settle with her, and won’t rest until they get that final confrontation.
My Reaction: On the surface, the plot of Mirrors sounds downright dumb. A demonic spirit that lives in mirrors and takes control of people’s reflections, forcing them to kill themselves? Uh huh. I’m seriously surprised that any studio gave this project the green light.
That being said, I am equally surprised at how well the story played out on screen. Don’t get me wrong, there were plenty of eye-roll moments in this movie, as well as several “Yeah, right!” scenes, but despite all that, I still found myself engrossed in the story for the most part. Even though the plot didn’t make much sense (I’m still not certain why the mirrors were after the nun), Kiefer Sutherland made the whole thing watchable. Yes, he basically played Jack Bauer in this one (even down to a few disgusted shouts of “Dammit!” exactly like Jack), but that’s what he does best.
I’ve read on a few message boards that some people didn’t like the ending, but I did. Frankly, I’m tired of seeing ordinary men turn into indestructible superheroes in Hollywood films, so it was nice to see someone actually feel the effects of a fight for once.
Overall, Mirrors is worth a watch. Yeah, the plot is outlandish and you could probably poke a thousand holes in the screenwriters’ logic, but suspension of disbelief (x10) is a prerequisite for watching horror films. I give this one 3 out of 5.
Oscar-winning actress Jennifer Hudson gave birth to a healthy baby boy yesterday. The baby, who weighed in at 7lbs and 14oz, is named David Daniel Otunga, Jr., after the father. Hudson and David Otunga, Sr. are engaged.
I really like Jennifer, and am happy to hear that her delivery went smoothly. She has been through a lot of bad times recently, so it’s good to see things falling back into place for her. Oh, and I have to say that I love how she named the baby something normal instead of going for some weirdo celeb name.
And maybe this will finally shut up the haters, some of whom insisted that Hudson wasn’t pregnant, but fat and said she should be stocking up on diet pills instead of diapers. Yeah, whatever. Just because a star doesn’t publicly confirm her pregnancy doesn’t mean it’s not true. Take a look at that Kevin Mazur/MJ Memorial/WireImage photo up there. Who wouldn’t know that she was pregnant???