Christmas Box Office: Grudge Match, Secret Life of Walter Mitty, Wolf of Wall Street
By Debbie
Schlussel
The grinches who dominate Hollywood don’t offer you much good or cheery at movie theaters today:
* “Grudge Match“: I didn’t particularly care for this movie, but I didn’t completely hate it like some movie critics did. It is mildly–very mildly–entertaining, BUT . . . . The jokes were mostly stupid–I laughed only a few times–and it has sexual themes, so you can’t really take your kids to see it. Plus, what is the point of a movie about two old guys in their 60s and 70s–one of whom is partially blind–preparing to fight each other? It’s not exciting to watch. It’s painful. Also, I could have done without the silly, trumped up melodrama story about two guys fighting over a girl who cheated on one of them with the other. This is Christmas fare? Really?
Here’s a tip, Hollywood: just because two famous actors once played boxers in successful movies, doesn’t mean it’s a sure fire formula for success to make them aging, senior citizen boxers doing a rematch when they are in their 60s and 70s. I mean, I don’t wanna see “Rocky XCMVII.” Do you?
The story: Sylvester Stallone and Robert De Niro play former champion boxers who were about to have a rematch in their prime. But the Stallone character retired before the match to get back at De Niro for sleeping with his girlfriend (Kim Basinger). De Niro also got the girlfriend pregnant and abandoned the kid. Yay, another “fathers suck” movie from Hollywood–Merry Christmas! Now it is years later,and both are old. Stallone still doesn’t want to do the rematch, but he needs the money. He spent all his boxing winnings and just got laid off from the plant where he works. He has a lot of overdue bills to pay. So, he agrees to the fight, and both he and De Niro begin training.
Predictably, De Niro becomes reunited with the kid he abandoned and Stallone gets reunited with the girlfriend he dumped after she cheated. Also, De Niro and Stallone get into repeated fights on the street in videos that go viral, making their boxing match a popular attraction.
Did I really need to see 70-year-old De Niro having sex in the middle of an SUV with some young woman, while his grandson catches them? Did I need to see a partially blind man get repeatedly slugged in his blind spot? And this is a comedy?
This isn’t Christmas entertainment. It’s two old actors doing whatever it takes–minus any scruples–to get a paycheck.
ONE MARX
Watch the trailer . . .
* “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty“: This is a remake (of sorts) of the 1947 Danny Kaye movie, but it’s less a remake than a new version of the James Thurber short story upon which the Kaye movie was based. I found it entertaining enough, but kind of dopey, and I wouldn’t pay ten bucks-plus to see it. Plus Sean Uber-Communist Penn is in it in a positive role. And the movie is anti-business, too. On top of all of that, eHarmony.com is a major part of the plot (with Papa John’s blatantly thrown in, too)–so it’s a commercial for a website and you pay ten bucks-plus and two hours to see it. The best part of the movie is a hilarious scene with the TSA. Other than that, it’s just okay. It’s not nearly as funny as typical Ben Stiller fare. Not even close.
The story: Ben Stiller plays Walter Mitty, who fantasizes about being heroic and doing larger than life things. In reality, he is a nerdy photo editor at Life Magazine. He learns that Life will publish its last hard copy issue and many employees will lose their jobs, since the company has been bought out. A new management team headed by Adam Scott (who, as I’ve noted on this site before, looks like Liza Minnelli) comes in and is obnoxious to everyone. He constantly has run-ins with Mitty and is mean-spirited and mocking in tone. A famous photographer (Penn), whose photos are used by Life, sends Stiller the negative for the final photo (he refuses to do digital). But Stiller cannot find the negative, and the boss threatens to fire him. So, he travels around the world and does things like skateboarding and running from a volcano to track down the photographer. (When he finally finds the photog, they watch Pakistanis in the middle of the mountains play soccer–and the peaceful Pakistani Muslims are so nice and inviting, they invite Mitty and Penn to join in. Like that really happens in real life. They (the Pakis) would kill them (Mitty and the photog) and use their head as the soccer ball.)
All throughout this story, Mitty is also trying to catch the eye of Cheryl (Kristen Wiig), who is a single mother and is on eHarmony. Mitty is constantly on the phone with the eHarmony customer service guy, trying to enhance Mitty’s online profile.
The end of the movie is touching, but the rest of it feels like it was mostly phoned in. I never saw the Danny Kaye version from beginning to end, just snippets, but I can’t imagine this version is better.
ONE REAGAN
Watch the trailer . . .
* “The Wolf of Wall Street“: I absolutely HATED this movie. Total garbage. And I’m disgusted that this movie celebrating crime and utter depravity was shown at the Obama White House.
The movie is way too long (THREE HOURS!!!), repetitive, boring, and full of illegal drug use, full-frontal nudity, disgustingly kinky sex scenes (Leonardo DiCRAPio’s butt up in the air with a lit candle sticking out of it as a dominatrix whips him), and anti-Wall Street crap. If you’ve seen “Boiler Room” and “Wall Street” and any other Hollywood movies attacking investment houses, you’ve already seen this unoriginal movie a gazillion times. I know I have. And while the movie goes out of its way to let you know that the main crooks here are Jews (one of them even wears a Jewish “Chai” necklace charm), they don’t tell you that the real-life JINO (Jew in Name Only) scumbag portrayed in this movie, Jordan Belfort, repeatedly describes each Jew he knows as a “savage Jew” in the book upon which this movie is based. As I said in my review of “American Hustle,” we Jews are only about 2.1% of the American population (to which we made many wonderful contributions throughout American history), but we are nearly 100% of the criminals in the Christmastime movies, this year.
And while the movie is an attack on Wall Street, most of Belfort’s crime was as an off-Wall-Street boiler room king in Long Island. Plus, the people involved with this movie, including that schmuck Jonah Hill a/k/a Jonah Hill Feldstein, actually reward Belfort for his disgusting, sleazy, criminal behavior because they paid him a boatload to use his book as a basis for the script–yes, the same book that refers to Jews as “savage Jew[s].” And the movie essentially sympathizes and laughs with Belfort, who is played by Leonardo DiCaprio).
The story: Jordan Belfort is the middle-class son of suburban New Yorkers (his father is an accountant played by Rob Reiner, in this movie), and he’s an aspiring investment adviser. But, just as he’s rising up the chain of command at the dishonest Wall Street firm where he works (and is encouraged to rip off customers), Black Monday happens (the late 1980s one-day big stock market crash), and he loses his job. His then-wife encourages him to apply for a job at a boiler room, and he soon realizes he can make even more money ripping people off on penny stocks. He soon opens his own such company with Jonah Hill and illegally, artificially pumps up stock prices, then sells his own shares, leaving his customers with worthless paper (this tactic is called “pump and dump”). Belfort does this with Steve Madden shoes stock, which was an interesting real life story that the movie could have explored but didn’t do much with. The real life Steve Madden went to jail over that. But this piece of trash movie doesn’t go into that part.
Belfort, upon becoming rich, flaunts it with extravagant taste in cars, homes, boats, etc., and he dumps his wife for a blonde model. He also flaunts his lifestyle in an attempt to taunt the FBI agent investigating him for insider trading and other illegal activities. He’s an obnoxious and an extremely offensive and unlikable character. And he’s a criminal beyond the insider trading and pump and dump schemes. He uses his wife’s elderly English aunt to launder and hide the money in Swiss bank accounts and tries to have sex with the aunt. Uggh. And Uggh is the key descriptor for this entire toilet bowl full of excrement disguised as a movie.
I regret that the real Jordan Belfort served very little jail time and is free and making more money off of his book and, now, this movie, glamorizing his criminal behavior and activities. He’s laughing all the way to the bank. Crime pays, apparently.
The real wolves in America are not the successful on Wall Street (many of whom, by the way, are liberals and Obama supporters). They are the producers and directors of Hollywood that bring this crap to the tarnished silver screen on a regular basis. I used to think Martin Scorsese was a talented director. What the hell was I thinking?
There’s nothing new in this movie. You’ve seen this anti-business rant on screen a million times. Don’t make it a million and one.
FOUR MARXES PLUS FOUR OBAMAS PLUS FOUR BIN LADENS
The grinches who dominate Hollywood don’t offer you much good or cheery at movie theaters today:
* “Grudge Match“: I didn’t particularly care for this movie, but I didn’t completely hate it like some movie critics did. It is mildly–very mildly–entertaining, BUT . . . . The jokes were mostly stupid–I laughed only a few times–and it has sexual themes, so you can’t really take your kids to see it. Plus, what is the point of a movie about two old guys in their 60s and 70s–one of whom is partially blind–preparing to fight each other? It’s not exciting to watch. It’s painful. Also, I could have done without the silly, trumped up melodrama story about two guys fighting over a girl who cheated on one of them with the other. This is Christmas fare? Really?
Here’s a tip, Hollywood: just because two famous actors once played boxers in successful movies, doesn’t mean it’s a sure fire formula for success to make them aging, senior citizen boxers doing a rematch when they are in their 60s and 70s. I mean, I don’t wanna see “Rocky XCMVII.” Do you?
The story: Sylvester Stallone and Robert De Niro play former champion boxers who were about to have a rematch in their prime. But the Stallone character retired before the match to get back at De Niro for sleeping with his girlfriend (Kim Basinger). De Niro also got the girlfriend pregnant and abandoned the kid. Yay, another “fathers suck” movie from Hollywood–Merry Christmas! Now it is years later,and both are old. Stallone still doesn’t want to do the rematch, but he needs the money. He spent all his boxing winnings and just got laid off from the plant where he works. He has a lot of overdue bills to pay. So, he agrees to the fight, and both he and De Niro begin training.
Predictably, De Niro becomes reunited with the kid he abandoned and Stallone gets reunited with the girlfriend he dumped after she cheated. Also, De Niro and Stallone get into repeated fights on the street in videos that go viral, making their boxing match a popular attraction.
Did I really need to see 70-year-old De Niro having sex in the middle of an SUV with some young woman, while his grandson catches them? Did I need to see a partially blind man get repeatedly slugged in his blind spot? And this is a comedy?
This isn’t Christmas entertainment. It’s two old actors doing whatever it takes–minus any scruples–to get a paycheck.
ONE MARX
Watch the trailer . . .
* “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty“: This is a remake (of sorts) of the 1947 Danny Kaye movie, but it’s less a remake than a new version of the James Thurber short story upon which the Kaye movie was based. I found it entertaining enough, but kind of dopey, and I wouldn’t pay ten bucks-plus to see it. Plus Sean Uber-Communist Penn is in it in a positive role. And the movie is anti-business, too. On top of all of that, eHarmony.com is a major part of the plot (with Papa John’s blatantly thrown in, too)–so it’s a commercial for a website and you pay ten bucks-plus and two hours to see it. The best part of the movie is a hilarious scene with the TSA. Other than that, it’s just okay. It’s not nearly as funny as typical Ben Stiller fare. Not even close.
The story: Ben Stiller plays Walter Mitty, who fantasizes about being heroic and doing larger than life things. In reality, he is a nerdy photo editor at Life Magazine. He learns that Life will publish its last hard copy issue and many employees will lose their jobs, since the company has been bought out. A new management team headed by Adam Scott (who, as I’ve noted on this site before, looks like Liza Minnelli) comes in and is obnoxious to everyone. He constantly has run-ins with Mitty and is mean-spirited and mocking in tone. A famous photographer (Penn), whose photos are used by Life, sends Stiller the negative for the final photo (he refuses to do digital). But Stiller cannot find the negative, and the boss threatens to fire him. So, he travels around the world and does things like skateboarding and running from a volcano to track down the photographer. (When he finally finds the photog, they watch Pakistanis in the middle of the mountains play soccer–and the peaceful Pakistani Muslims are so nice and inviting, they invite Mitty and Penn to join in. Like that really happens in real life. They (the Pakis) would kill them (Mitty and the photog) and use their head as the soccer ball.)
All throughout this story, Mitty is also trying to catch the eye of Cheryl (Kristen Wiig), who is a single mother and is on eHarmony. Mitty is constantly on the phone with the eHarmony customer service guy, trying to enhance Mitty’s online profile.
The end of the movie is touching, but the rest of it feels like it was mostly phoned in. I never saw the Danny Kaye version from beginning to end, just snippets, but I can’t imagine this version is better.
ONE REAGAN
Watch the trailer . . .
* “The Wolf of Wall Street“: I absolutely HATED this movie. Total garbage. And I’m disgusted that this movie celebrating crime and utter depravity was shown at the Obama White House.
The movie is way too long (THREE HOURS!!!), repetitive, boring, and full of illegal drug use, full-frontal nudity, disgustingly kinky sex scenes (Leonardo DiCRAPio’s butt up in the air with a lit candle sticking out of it as a dominatrix whips him), and anti-Wall Street crap. If you’ve seen “Boiler Room” and “Wall Street” and any other Hollywood movies attacking investment houses, you’ve already seen this unoriginal movie a gazillion times. I know I have. And while the movie goes out of its way to let you know that the main crooks here are Jews (one of them even wears a Jewish “Chai” necklace charm), they don’t tell you that the real-life JINO (Jew in Name Only) scumbag portrayed in this movie, Jordan Belfort, repeatedly describes each Jew he knows as a “savage Jew” in the book upon which this movie is based. As I said in my review of “American Hustle,” we Jews are only about 2.1% of the American population (to which we made many wonderful contributions throughout American history), but we are nearly 100% of the criminals in the Christmastime movies, this year.
And while the movie is an attack on Wall Street, most of Belfort’s crime was as an off-Wall-Street boiler room king in Long Island. Plus, the people involved with this movie, including that schmuck Jonah Hill a/k/a Jonah Hill Feldstein, actually reward Belfort for his disgusting, sleazy, criminal behavior because they paid him a boatload to use his book as a basis for the script–yes, the same book that refers to Jews as “savage Jew[s].” And the movie essentially sympathizes and laughs with Belfort, who is played by Leonardo DiCaprio).
The story: Jordan Belfort is the middle-class son of suburban New Yorkers (his father is an accountant played by Rob Reiner, in this movie), and he’s an aspiring investment adviser. But, just as he’s rising up the chain of command at the dishonest Wall Street firm where he works (and is encouraged to rip off customers), Black Monday happens (the late 1980s one-day big stock market crash), and he loses his job. His then-wife encourages him to apply for a job at a boiler room, and he soon realizes he can make even more money ripping people off on penny stocks. He soon opens his own such company with Jonah Hill and illegally, artificially pumps up stock prices, then sells his own shares, leaving his customers with worthless paper (this tactic is called “pump and dump”). Belfort does this with Steve Madden shoes stock, which was an interesting real life story that the movie could have explored but didn’t do much with. The real life Steve Madden went to jail over that. But this piece of trash movie doesn’t go into that part.
Belfort, upon becoming rich, flaunts it with extravagant taste in cars, homes, boats, etc., and he dumps his wife for a blonde model. He also flaunts his lifestyle in an attempt to taunt the FBI agent investigating him for insider trading and other illegal activities. He’s an obnoxious and an extremely offensive and unlikable character. And he’s a criminal beyond the insider trading and pump and dump schemes. He uses his wife’s elderly English aunt to launder and hide the money in Swiss bank accounts and tries to have sex with the aunt. Uggh. And Uggh is the key descriptor for this entire toilet bowl full of excrement disguised as a movie.
I regret that the real Jordan Belfort served very little jail time and is free and making more money off of his book and, now, this movie, glamorizing his criminal behavior and activities. He’s laughing all the way to the bank. Crime pays, apparently.
The real wolves in America are not the successful on Wall Street (many of whom, by the way, are liberals and Obama supporters). They are the producers and directors of Hollywood that bring this crap to the tarnished silver screen on a regular basis. I used to think Martin Scorsese was a talented director. What the hell was I thinking?
There’s nothing new in this movie. You’ve seen this anti-business rant on screen a million times. Don’t make it a million and one.
FOUR MARXES PLUS FOUR OBAMAS PLUS FOUR BIN LADENS
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment