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 about 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 choosing good movies to watch yourself!

Wknd Box Office: San Andreas, Aloha, Iris, The Connection

By Debbie Schlussel

One shiny, sparkling documentary among the new movies opening in theaters this weekend. And the rest are, for the most part, dogs. Sorry for my late reviews. But, you can always hear my movie reviews live, first thing every Friday morning on “The Mike Church Show” on SiriusXM Patriot Channel 125 after 7:05 a.m. Eastern, on “The Pat Campbell Show” on KFAQ 1170 AM Tulsa at 7:35 a.m. Eastern, and on “The James Show,” on KWTX 1230 AM at 8:30 a.m. Eastern. I do my movie reviews on all three shows, as well as some discussion of current political issues and pop culture topics.
* “San Andreas“: This movie is ridiculous . . . ridiculously unbelievable. And not in a good way. There is fatal disaster after fatal disaster, and yet, despite all credible odds, each of the main characters survives each deadly situation without much of a hair out of place. And the movie is basically a mash-up/rip-off of “2012” (read my review), which is by the same filmmakers, and the “Taken” movies. This one, like the “Taken” movies, has a wife who’s divorcing the financially broke superhuman human (with “special skills”) in favor of a cowardly billionaire and his mansion. And, like the “Taken” movies, this one has a daughter the superhuman father is trying to protect and save. Like “2012,” an earthly disaster–in this case, an earthquake, threatens to destroy California (I loved the scene in which the “Hollywood” sign’s letters tumble down the hill on which they are mounted.)
The story: Duane “The Rock” Johnson is a jack of all trades and a MacGyver of sorts. He’s a first responder, whose wife is divorcing him. The wife (Carla Gugino) and his daughter have moved into a billionaire’s mansion. But, soon, a massive earthquake hits San Francisco and an expert (Paul Giamatti) predicts that it will strike the entire San Andreas Fault with a magnitude and force unlike that which has ever struck the earth. Giamatti has created a computer model that can predict where and when earthquakes will strike, and after seeing the Hoover Dam fall to the initial earthquake, he warns everyone to get out of San Francisco.
Soon, the first of the earthquakes hits San Francisco, and Johnson’s daughter is trapped in a car in the basement of her mother’s billionaire boyfriend’s building. The boyfriend is a coward and flees, leaving the daughter in the trapped car, where she will die if not rescued. A guy who was interviewing for a job and had met the daughter as he was waiting for his appointment, sees the billionaire telling a guard where the girl is. So, he and his little brother find her and rescue her. Then, together, they flee and try to reach her father, Johnson. Ultimately, they get in touch and plan to meet at a higher point of land somewhere near San Francisco. In the meantime, Johnson has rescued his estranged wife from the top of a skyscraper. The movie is filled with disasters, from none of which a normal person would ever live or be rescued. But in this movie, it’s situation after situation like that, and the daughter gets rescued.
I saw this in 3D, and even though the 3D effects were decent in this, you’ll be fine staying with 2D and without shelling out extra. Like I said, there’s nothing you can believe in this movie. Not even remotely. There is not suspending disbelief for even a second. But it’s definitely non-stop, entertaining action, and you won’t be bored at all. It’s like the movie, “Earthquake,” with a faster pace and much better special effects.
That said, I could have done without the Oprahfied segment of the movie in which Johnson starts crying and apologizing to the wife over how their relationship broke down after the death of their other daughter. PUH-LEEZE. And right in the middle of a catastrophe, in which there’s not time for that. I wanted to slap him and shout, “MAN UP!” The same for multiple other scenes like this between Johnson and Gugino and between the daughter and the guy who rescues her. Um, there’s no time for that when your life is in danger from massive earthquakes.
There’s a nice patriotic flourish at the end with an American flag in the foreground and Johnson saying, “We will rebuild.”
ONE REAGAN

Watch the trailer . . .

* “Aloha“: I was not invited to screen this movie, and it wasn’t promoted (or even represented, I believe) by the normal studio representatives for most other big feature films. But I went and saw it on my own. Big mistake. The word, “Aloha,” can be used as a greeting of hello. But it can also be used to say good-bye, which you’d be best advised to do. It’s just awful. The movie is a long, boring, disjointed, nonsensical slog containing multiple, stupid, uninteresting stories.
Bradley Cooper is a jaded former Air Force man in the space program Now, he’s an unethical contractor for a greasy, strange billionaire (Bill Murray) and his Blackwater-esque company. He meets with militant, anti-American Hawaiians to get their blessing for the installation of a pedestrian gate at an Air Force airport and the launch of a satellite. His babysitter is Emma Stone, a fighter pilot who is liked by Hillary Clinton and is on her “Honor Guard” or something like that. (Do we have so many fighter pilots and so little for them to do that they are put on babysitting duty with contractors?)
Stone is half Asian and a quarter Hawaiian (funny, she doesn’t look Hawaiish), and she has endless conversations with Cooper and the militant Hawaiians about Hawaiian mystical folklore that sounds like gibberish and is never explained. Cooper’s ex-girlfriend (Rachel McAdams) is also at the base, and she is married to a guy who barely speaks and instead communicates with looks and gestures. McAdams is whining to Cooper about how he was the love of her life and didn’t pay her enough attention. Stone is anti-weaponry (which is weird since she’s a fighter pilot for the U.S. Air Force–hellooooooo . . . .?). And she gets all upset when she learns that the billionaire for whom Cooper is working wants to launch nuclear weapons into space with his satellite, making him unaccountable to anyone. So, Cooper destroys the satellite after launch to win Stone’s heart. Then, Cooper finds out McAdams’ daughter is his child. The End. Oh, and did I mention that fat Alec Baldwin plays an angry Air Force commander and that another Air Force officer does weird things with his fingers?
Sound like a great movie to you? Me neither. And I sat through this Gitmo-torture-worthy crap. This was clearly nothing more than a paycheck for every actor involved. “Aloha” is a low blah.
THREE MARXES PLUS TWO ISIS BEHEADINGS

Watch the trailer . . .

* “Iris“: This is by far one of the most enjoyable, light, entertaining documentaries I’ve seen in a long time. And it’s not about anything serious or important. Just the opposite, in fact. But, still, I was thoroughly enthralled and amused by it.
It’s about the life of Iris Apfel, a 93-year-old Jewish lady from New York City, who has become something of a fashion icon and entrepreneur very late in life. Her husband, Carl Apfel, turns 100 during the movie, and the filmmaker/director, Albert Maysles, died in March of this year at age 88.
If you’ve ever read any fashion magazines or human interest articles in any of the major newspapers you’ve probably seen or heard of Iris, the woman with the giant, round black glasses and outrageously loud and massive costume jewelry. My late Grandma Marilyn used to use the yiddish term for this kind of dressing up: “fah-putzed.” The movie begins showing Iris putting on layers and layers of loud, chunky jewelry and clothes, and we soon learn that she has one of the largest and most expensive collections of costume jewelry in the world. She also has a giant collection of collectible chachkes and knickknacks in her two fancy New York apartments and her Palm Beach condo. That even includes a Christmas train display (she and Carl are Jewish, though that isn’t mentioned in the film).
Iris’ collection is so different and so well known that it became an exhibit at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute’s annual charity fundraiser. As a result, her renown took off, with write-ups by all the top fashion publications and newspapers of record. The buzz made her a star in the fashion world, and soon, she was consulted by major fashion designers and buzzed about by celebrities (the movie shows Kanye West telling her how much he admires her). Because of all this, Iris started her own jewelry and shoe line, which quickly sold out on HSN.
Watching this, you wonder how Iris got all this money to buy all these expensive designer clothes and costume jewels to pile on and store in three residences. And that’s, frankly, the more interesting part of the movie, as dazzling as the eye candy of her jewels and fashions.
Iris built a career as an interior decorator, beginning in the 1950s. In the ’60s, she began working with the first of eight Presidents, including Reagan, in helping to decorate the White House. Her husband mentions that Jackie Kennedy didn’t like them because there was “that incident,” but this is a tease because they don’t tell you the story (Iris admonishes her husband to keep quiet about it). I really do wanna know that story.
But Iris was more than an interior decorator. She was an entrepreneur. When she began her career in interior design, Iris wanted fabrics that didn’t exist. So, she went to various weavers and loomers and contracted them to create fabrics using the designs she created. The fabrics were so in demand that she and her husband partnered with one of the weavers to create a company, Old World Weavers, a textile firm that created her unusual designs, most of them classics in the style of old world Europe. Because of the fabrics, she was invited to restore and decorate state Houses of Representatives and the White House, as well as lots of private, wealthy residences.
It’s really a great story of American talent, ingenuity, and capitalism. Above all, Iris’ message–and we should all take it to heart–is individualism. Don’t be a follower. Make your own style.
And Iris, although a New York socialite and likely a part of the New York social left, is not a liberal when it comes to feminists and children. She declares in the film that she decided early on not to have children because she wanted a career. She frankly states, “Women cannot have it all,” and adds that if she wanted both a career and children, one would suffer–the career or the kids. She says she didn’t want to have children who were raised by a nanny. I liked that she is open about this and doesn’t buy into the fantasy that you can have it all as a career women. You can’t.
Although it’s only an hour and 20 minutes, I felt the movie was a little repetitive toward the end, but that was a minor thing. Overall, I really enjoyed watching this. It’s not just eye candy for women interested in fashion, although I do love that stuff. It’s also funny and amusing, as Iris is so over the top and is in on the joke. She enjoys all the ridiculous hype over her. And how hype has turned this ancient Jewish lady into a fashion icon (who was never a model or a fashion designer before) is part of the statement of this movie. I believe men will find this almost as enjoyable as the women (or gay boyfriends) they take to see it. Or at least, they will definitely find it hilarious and fun to watch.
Despite her wealth, Iris shows that you can find her over-the-top style of jewelry at very affordable prices on the streets and shops of Harlem and little flea markets in your neck of the woods. Still, the movie is an interesting, relaxing look at how the beautiful–and not so beautiful, but very rich–live.
Absolutely fabulous.
FOUR REAGANS

Watch the trailer . . .

* “The Connection [La French]“: This French-language film with English subtitles shows us the French side of “The French Connection,” the drug ring that smuggled dope into America in the early ’70s. The mob is run by an Italian Frenchman, Gaetan “Tany” Zampa. But the movie’s focus is on the man who fearlessly prosecutes him, French magistrate Pierre Michel (Jean Dujardin).
While this is a very courageous story and features clear right versus clear wrong, I felt the movie was predictable and something I’d seen a million times before. I know the filmmakers can’t help that: this is a true story, and it depicts what happened. Still, I felt like the movie came about 30 years too late, as we’ve seen so many of these movies already. That said, the acting is very good and makes it entertaining and enjoyable. It’s definitely not boring. And I liked seeing the 1970s-style fashion, cars, and sets. It’s not a bad movie, just not much new in it.
ONE-AND-A-HALF REAGANS

Watch the trailer . . .

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 about 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 choosing good movies to watch yourself!

Weekend Box Office: The Monuments Men,Vampire Academy, Gloria

By Debbie Schlussel
I really liked one of the new movies in theaters today, but hated the other two. I did not see “The Lego Movie,” as the screening was held on the Jewish Sabbath. (Too bad b/c it looks like fun.) But I posted my favorite Lego/movie combination video, below.


* “The Monuments Men“: Of all the films I’ve ever reviewed, I cannot remember getting as many inquiries from friends and readers as I’ve gotten asking me if I saw this movie and what I thought. My answer: yes, and it’s a great movie.
A lot of the mainstream liberal movie critics are bashing this film. Ignore them. It’s fantastic. I really liked and enjoyed this, even if I sharply disagree with its stated premise–that saving art is worth losing American (and American allies’) soldiers’ lives. It is not (at least in my opinion; you might disagree). (I also don’t subscribe to George Clooney’s character’s statement that art isn’t owned by anyone in particular–that it is all of ours. If I owned a Cezanne, I’m not required to open my house to the world to visit, am I?) Still, as modern World War II movies go, this was touching at times, funny at others, and showed Nazi evil (though not that much). For those who won’t see this because of stars George Clooney’s and Matt Damon’s arrogant lefty politics, I hear ya, and I don’t blame you for not wanting to help their movies make money. But it’s still a great movie.

During the Iraq War, Rush Limbaugh inaccurately declared on his nationally syndicated radio show that, during World War II, we never spared buildings and redirected bombing to protect art. When I heard that, I shouted at the radio, “um, wrong.” I’d seen the long, boring documentary, “The Rape of Europa,” in which soldiers who worked for the unit that did exactly that, explained that they shielded some strategic Nazi installations to save art. As you probably know, the movie is about the “Monuments Men,” the real-life unit of American (and some Allied) soldiers, who were actually older men of various art backgrounds. They were inducted into the Army to protect museums and churches housing great artworks and sculptures from Allied bombings and to return art stolen by the Nazis from Jews to their rightful owners. I have not read the book of the same name, but I understand that this fictional movie “based on a true story” is loosely based on the book.
One scene brought a tear to my eyes: it is Christmas Eve, and one of the Monuments Men, Bill Murray, is taking a shower in a tent. Meanwhile, in another tent, another Monuments Man (Bob Balaban) plays a record album (remember those?) with a recorded message from his family. He plays it on the camp’s loudspeaker, and it features his wife wishing him and everyone well and a “Merry Christmas.” Then, she sings, “Have Yourself a Very Merry Christmas.” Bill Murray stops his shower to listen and has a tear in his eye. It’s a very touching moment. (Not mentioned in the movies is that the Jewish Welfare Board–a Jewish organization founded to help Jewish-American and Gentile-American soldiers during the various American wars–provided the recording booth and equipment and the records. I have a few of them in my collection of US-Jewish military memorabilia.) Another great scene features a German Jewish immigrant to the U.S. who has enlisted in the Army (Dimitri Leonidas as “Sam Epstein”) and his interaction with captured German soldiers.
The acting in this movie is terrific. Everyone from Cate Blanchett (as a French woman who is connected to the underground/partisans) to John Goodman to, yes, Clooney and Damon, displays excellent acting chops. While the movie is a little bit slow and confusing at first, it quickly heats up to suspense and drama. And when it’s not occupied by those, it’s funny and poignant. It’s also a bit of mystery/adventure and caper film. And, overall, it’s an enjoyable World War II movie.
FOUR REAGANS



* “Vampire Academy“: I’m sick and tired of the teen vampire love story stuff. It’s been done to death. Um, “Twilight” movies, anyone? And, this time around, it’s as stupid and boring as ever (and confusing). This junk makes the “Twilight” movies look downright Shakespearean. And the movie posters bear the “charming” tagline, “They Suck At School.”
The movie takes place at a teen vampire academy, populated by the good vampires (called, the “Moroi”) and their half-vampire, half-human protectors (called “Dhampirs”). The good vampires and their protectors must fight off the evil vampires (called, the “Strigoi”). Almost everyone at the vampire academy looks like a young supermodel (there is only one ugly vampire–I guess she’s what they call “diversity”). The movie focuses on a vampire princess orphan and her protector (Zoe Deutch, who looks like a cross between Rose Byrne and Jordana Brewster). Someone is killing the princess’ cat and playing other tricks against her and the protector. They must find out who it is and why.
Not that I cared. This very uninteresting, unexciting movie is dull and a waste of time. And it has a weird lesbian vampire-drinking-dhampir-blood vibe with constant scenes of the princess vampire drinking blood out of the dhampir protector’s neck and the dhampir making orgasmic noises. Um, no thank you. This movie is aimed at teen girls, but if I had a teen daughter, I wouldn’t want her to see it. It’s gross–a lot of blood. And just plain dumb.
THREE MARXES



* “Gloria“: Just awful. A Chilean movie (with English subtitles) about a post-middle-age, divorced cat lady, Gloria, who is seeking a date and sex. She meets a formerly fat guy who had stomach-stapling surgery and begins a sexual relationship with him. But he is constantly leaving her for his daughters and ex-wife who rely on him for money and help. Then, she dances at a disco to the Spanish version of the ’80s hit song, “Gloria” (originally sung by the late Laura Branigan). The end.
Yes, this is actually a “movie.” I know–incredible. I could not have been more bored and disgusted. Slow, boring, pointless and chock full of more frontal nudity and crotch shots of this post-middle-age chubby zaftig chick than I shall ever need to see. Ever.
Ick. BARFitudinous
A time bandit that stole two hours of my life I’ll never get back. Dreksville.
FOUR MARXES



***

Wknd Box Office: Hyde Park on Hudson, Jack Reacher, The Guilt Trip, This is 40

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 about 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: Hyde Park on Hudson, Jack Reacher, The Guilt Trip, This is 40


By Debbie Schlussel



With Christmas in just a few days, this is the time that Hollywood is supposed to put out its biggest, best blockbusters. Instead, they give us schlock, which is the best descriptor for the new movies at theaters, this weekend.



* “Hyde Park on Hudson“: A while ago I wrote on this site about a disgusting scene in a movie in which a President I don’t even like is shown getting manually masturbated by someone. That was this movie, as some readers correctly guessed. It’s Hollywood’s way of attacking and taking down every single authority figure in American history, even the uber-liberal, statist ones they revere. This long, slow, boring, creepy movie presents an even creepier version of Franklin D. Roosevelt than anything I’ve seen on any President. FDR (played by Bill Murray) is portrayed as a sleazy, sex-obsessed weirdo, who doesn’t let a visit to his Hyde Park estate by the King and Queen of England get in the way of his conquests of multiple members of his harem. Yuck.



This is the story of Margaret Suckley (in the movie, she is just “Daisy,” probably for obvious reasons), FDR’s plain Jane fifth or sixth cousin (in the movie, she says they’re not sure which it is), who is recruited by FDR’s mother to “entertain” him at the Hyde Park estate one summer during his Presidency. Yup, FDR’s mother–as portrayed in this movie–is his pimp, and ultimately Daisy becomes one of his several concubines, joining his secretary and one of his longtime wealthy patrons in the harem. The movie is supposedly based on Suckley’s diaries and letters between her and FDR that were allegedly found under her bed after her death at age 99 in 1991. Suckley is played by Laura Linney.



Skip this barf-fest at all cost.



FOUR MARXES




* “Jack Reacher“: I was really looking forward to this movie based on the thriller novels of author Lee Child. But what a letdown. While there were some mildly cool car chase and shooting scenes that are inserted in any action thriller, the movie was silly and preposterous–particularly when it comes to the plot and the storyline. It wasn’t interesting or thrilling most of the time, and you don’t really care “whodunit.” The why is stupid and never ever explained, nor is much of what is going on. It’s not a tight script, and I’m surprised this movie is coming out now, instead of January or August, the cemeteries of movies where Hollywood sends the worst movies to die a quick death. Tom Cruise is his usual great acting self, but he produced this jalopy of a movie so he takes the blame for the bad vehicle featuring his good acting.



The plot: a former Army sniper who served in the Middle East is accused of shooting five people from a parking garage across the river. He writes a note to prosecutors to get Jack Reacher, a mysterious superhero-type of a guy in the form of a retired military police investigator, played by Cruise. He’s not only a brilliant investigator, but a great physical fighter, car chaser, shooter, and so on. Reacher is hired by the accused’s defense lawyer, who also happens to be the daughter of the district attorney prosecuting her client. Someone is out to get Reacher as he gets closer to the truth. Is it the district attorney? To be honest, I didn’t care much because the movie is that bad. The only good thing about this is the presence of Robert Duvall, but even that isn’t enough to make things right.



I’m surprised this is PG-13, since it’s violent and includes a scene in which the bad guy tries to make someone bite his own fingers off. Sick. Sad. Long. Boring. Waste of time.



HALF A MARX


* “The Guilt Trip“: Barbra Streisand and Seth Rogen play an ambiguously but stereotypically Jewish mother and son with the last name, Brewster, who go on a road trip together, as Rogen tries to sell his invention (an organic cleaning solution made out of fruit) to major retailers. Streisand is your stereotypical, annoying, guilt-inducing, intrusive Jewish mother who asks questions about the most personal and inserts herself everywhere she’s not wanted. Rogen can’t stand it, but he feels sorry for her and takes her along on the trip so she can reunite with her long lost first love, after whom he’s named.



While there are some parts of this movie that are alternately very funny or touching and endearing, mostly it’s just a non-stop reel of bad joke after bad joke and stupid, raunchy joke after stupid, raunchy joke. I liked the idea of a mother/son road trip, which we haven’t seen before at the movies. I just liked it without these two, neither of whom I like much at all. And too much of this movie was melodramatic angst and whining and screaming that’s just what people go to the movies to get away from. In the end, the messages are two of the typical and predictable ones: mother knows best and mother and son will do best by getting along after all.



A side note on this: after the screening I attended, there was a live telecast featuring Streisand and Rogen. I don’t like Seth Rogen, but his stock went up 1,000% after seeing the telecast, since all he did was rip on Streisand and her ridiculous lifestyle and demands. The movie was supposed to be a road trip, but Streisand is so special in her own mind and so absurd in her demands that the whole movie had to be done from a warehouse and sets built especially for her, since she insisted on filming the entire movie 15 minutes from her Malibu home, after making increasing demands of the filmmakers. During the live telecast, Streisand constantly whined about how hard it is to drive and how impossible it is to drive at night. She also spoke of how difficult the internet is, as is checking things online It was a nice insight to how out of touch this over-pampered far-left, Obama-supporting celeb is. As in, very.



As I said, while some of this is very funny, it’s also very overwrought and annoying. It was mildly entertaining, though, and better than all of the other new offerings.



HALF A REAGAN



* “This is 40“: It takes a lot to sit through this incredibly long, boring, 2 1/3 hours whine-fest. If seeing a naked husband (Paul Rudd) with butt and legs in the air looking in a mirror to see if he has hemorrhoids is your idea of a good time, then this is your movie. For the rest of us, um, no thanks. This is writer/director Judd Apatow’s latest raunchfest, and in this case, it’s not even funny. Just gross and extremely whiny.



Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann (Apatow’s real-life wife) play Pete and Debbie, the husband and wife from Apatow’s “Knocked Up” (read my review). They are both turning 40 and don’t want to face it, instead having signs of a mid-life crisis. They are constantly arguing over his secret eating of cupcakes (sugar isn’t allowed in the household), his support of his father and the father’s new family with an airline stewardess, and other things I couldn’t care less to hear about. They read their kids’ facebook accounts and confront the boys who attack their kids online. Debbie worries about her women’s clothing store and who stole $10,000 from it. Pete is worried about his failing new record company and the fact that he can’t sell CDs of his latest golden oldie rocker.



Lots of bickering, shouting, yelling, and so on. Very little that’s entertaining. Why pay money to go to the movies to see this when you can see it in households across America or in divorce court? And in those places, it’s a lot more interesting than this portrayal of spoiled very-upper-middle class people living beyond their means and constantly complaining about nothing.



TWO MARXES