Wknd Box Office: In Time, Anonymous, Rum Diary, Love Crime, Paranormal Activity 3

Here is an interesting article from http://www.debbieschlussel.com/  reviewing some of the movies that came out over the past weekend. This follows this post some of the movies from last week and  THIS POST about some movies that have been released over the past few years that you might have missed!  This all  follows this post about guidelines to chosing good movies to watch yourself!

Wknd Box Office: In Time, Anonymous, Rum Diary, Love Crime, Paranormal Activity 3


By Debbie Schlussel



The best new movie, out this weekend, is a foreign language arthouse film. Plus I really liked “Paranormal Activity 3,” which I couldn’t review for you, last week, due to Jewish holidays. And speaking of Jewish, it’s no shocker that one of the biggest releases this weekend is not-so-veiled anti-Semitic cinematic rantings of the Occupy Wall Street smellies.


* “In Time“: This is “high-styled Occupy Wall Street cinema.” So obvious, so absurd. And, yes, so anti-Semitic. What a coincidence that the bad people in this movie are the wealthy. And that the biggest villain of them all is a stingy moneylender, er . . . “timelender,” named Philippe Weis (pronounced, “Weiss”). Historically, Jews have been the money changers and money lender villains of Europe. No surprise that Hollywood Jew-haters repeated the Jew scapegoating and stingy canards here. They don’t say he’s Jewish–they don’t have to. Oh, and then there’s that “numbers on your arm” thing. Looks just like the tattoo my cousin Avraham had after his time in the camps.



The plot of this silly OWS flick: it’s the future. The aging gene shuts off at age 25, and that’s how you look for the rest of your life, except that you need to earn or inherit time to live longer. Everyone has a clock on their arm that begins running at age 25. The poor have only a few hours to live at a time. They get paid in time and pay for goods and services in time. The social hierarchy is such that the rate of cost in time constantly goes up in order that the poor will die more quickly. The rich live outside the ghetto and “unfairly” have a lot of time. Yup, in this movie, time–not money–is the currency. The rich ask their fellow rich, “Do you come from time?” (instead of the old, “Do you come from money?”).



Will Salas (Justin Timberlake) is out to fight the “injustice” of it all. He is from the ghetto and is poor. But, one night, he saves the life of a man rich in time. The man gives him more than a century in time. Just as Will runs to give some of it to his mother, she dies–she runs out of time. And Will sets to buy himself into the wealthy neighborhood of New Greenwich, so he can get revenge on the wealthy for his mother’s death. There he meets a rich girl, Amanda Seyfried a/k/a Sylvia Weis (hmmm . . . sounds like a Jewish grandmother’s name–why didn’t they just name her, “Rachel Horowitz,” and be even more obvious about their animus toward Jews?). She’s the daughter of the evil rich guy money-lender. Soon, there is a whole Bonnie and Clyde/Robin Hood story going on, too.



Sound like OWS fantasy? That’s exactly what it is. One movie critic chastised me for saying so, claiming that the movie was made two years ago so that means it has nothing to do with Occupy Wall Street. Really? Anyone listening to Hollywood’s hypocritical, limousine liberal views on entrepreneurs and businessmen over the last several decades knows where OWS was born and where it finds kindred spirits by the gazillion actor/waiters.



The thing is, just like Justin Timberlake’s character in the movie says and thinks it’s not fair that he works so hard and has little, while the wealthy work little and have so much, I think I work far harder than Timberlake. While he lolls around Hollywood and New York drinking and supping and barely working, I toil daily. And yet, I have far less than he. So, maybe, as he claims in this movie, I have a right to his multi-millions and should rob him of them, as he does the wealthy in this flick.



But I’d never get away with it because just like the rest of Hollywood, Timberlake is a do as I say, not as I do kind o’ guy.



And that’s the real moral of this movie. I loved the style of the movie and the cool cars. Hated the message and the not-so-subtle agitprop about the JOOOOS. Skip it. If ever there was a Marx-worthy movie, this is it.



FOUR MARXES PLUS



* “Anonymous“: Even putting aside that this movie co-stars the butt-ugliest woman on earth, Vanessa “Zionist Hoodlums” Redgrave (and I cannot put that aside–sorry!), it’s long, slow, boring, confusing, and frankly, silly.



While it’s long been rumored and theorized by some that William Shakespeare did not write his plays, this movie isn’t the story of Sir Francis Bacon, who is believed to be the real author of the plays. Instead, it’s some stupid contrived soap opera about an effeminate, philandering girlieman noble, Edward De Vere, the Earl of Oxford, who allegedly wrote the plays. It’s absurd and there are so many constant flashbacks and flash forwards, it’s hard to understand exactly what is going on until the movie is more than half over. And, by then, you’re bored to tears, if still awake. (I suppose I should be happy that Hollywood isn’t claiming the Muslims wrote the plays and were victimized by Shakespeare.)



I’d love to know what motivated whoever it was that wrote this stuff to write Macbeth or the steretypical Shylock in the Merchant of Venice. But this was none of that. Instead, it’s just a froofy, flowery set of men in ancient English royal costumes pretending to play “Desperate Housewives.” And even the real thing is being canceled by ABC. If you’re a gay man and like to dress like a woman, you’ll probably like this. For everyone else, stay away. You were warned.



After watching this, I couldn’t care less who really wrote Shakespeare’s stuff and why. It’s miserable. Forget this. . . unless you have trouble falling asleep and warm milk won’t do.



TWO MARXES




* “The Rum Diary“: This was boring, silly, and mostly not funny. No surprise, as it was written by the vastly overrated late druggie nutcase, Hunter S. Thompson. I never understood the fascination with that wack job, and this renews my global thought on everything Thompson: “Huh????” If this movie is what it means to be a “gonzo journalist,” it’s no wonder Gonzo is the name of a muppet.



I’m not sure what the point of this movie without an interesting plot or resolution was. Clearly, the point wasn’t to entertain, as this is slow and boring, and nothing gets accomplished. It takes place in the 1960s Puerto Rico with your typical anti-business plot. Evil, mostly-White businessmen want to colonize an unnamed island that is just off the coast of Puerto Rico and part of the territory. Although its name is never mentioned, I presume it’s Vieques, since the U.S. military is conducting test bombing exercises nearby. It’s irrelevant, though, because nothing ever happens. The stale Johnny Depp comes to a dying newspaper in Puerto Rico, where he meets a publicist (Aaron Eckhart) looking for a writer to pimp and promote his island hotel idea. Depp falls in love with Eckhart’s beautiful young fiancee. And, again, nothing much happens. And the movie ends.



Congrats, you just wasted ten bucks and two hours for nothing. The dead pothead, Hunter S. Thompson, is having the last laugh from hell, after all. Sucker. Like “Anonymous,” this is great for the sleep-deprived. Will put you out in a quick minute. One more thing: the Johnny-Depp-I’m-Cool-In-a-Weird-Offbeat-Way act is old, tired, and hackneyed. Time for it to retire.



FOUR MARXES




* “Love Crime [Crime D'Amour]“: I enjoyed this tight and suspenseful thriller, which is in French with English subtitles. It’s a “get revenge on the boss” flick, but far superior to the dumb and mean-spirited “Horrible Bosses” (read my review). Isabelle (a de-glammed Ludivine Sagnier) stars as the hard-working, bright assistant to Christine (Kristin Scott Thomas), a heartless, cold boss. Christine steals Isabelle’s ideas, takes credit for them, and does what she can to keep Isabelle down. But when she publicly humiliates her, Isabelle can take no more. And that’s when the thrills begin. To say more would give away too much.



This is well edited and fast-paced, interesting and entertaining. It’s playing mostly at arthouse theaters, so if you can’t find it playing nearby, it’s a great rental to watch at home.



THREE REAGANS





* “Paranormal Activity 3“: I liked this the best, by far, of the three Paranormal Activity movies. It’s a great “scary movie,” and it frightens without graphic violence or otherwise base manipulation. Instead, this movie goes back to the oldtime great horror flicks, which relied on mind games and psychology to scare you. That’s what makes a great horror thriller, and that’s what this is. You needn’t have seen any of the other Paranormal Activity movies to get this. It was well done.



A couple of pregnant women who are somehow related find a box of VCR videotapes of family from the ’80s. When they look again, the box of tapes is missing. Suddenly, we are shown what’s on the tapes. It’s the late ’80s. A 20- or 3o-something guy marries a woman with two daughters and has moved in with them to their very cool house. The guy has a wedding videotape business. Soon, weird things are happening in the house–noises at night, things being moved, etc. The guy sets up video cameras to record what’s happening as they are sleeping. It’s creepy.



I can’t say more, except that it builds slowly to a lot of frightful chills and shivers. I hated the first “Paranormal Activity” (read my review). I liked the second one slightly better (read my review). But this one was really good. If you like a good horror flick without the blood, guts, and gore, this is it. Spooky and creepy the way it’s supposed to be done.



THREE REAGANS