Or the Gentleman’s C's of Filmmaking (or worse)
‘Tis the Dog Days of Summer
and the Multiplex is Primarily Offering You:
Air Conditioning
The Movie Tipper Recommends that You Just Stay Home
Movies Reviewed
The November Man | Life of Crime | The Calling | And So It Goes
‘Tis the Dog Days of Summer
and the Multiplex is Primarily Offering You:
Air Conditioning
The Movie Tipper Recommends that You Just Stay Home
Movies Reviewed
The November Man | Life of Crime | The Calling | And So It Goes
The November Man
Movie Tipper Rating: C
Movie Tipper Rating: C
OK, for the late summer middlebrow action movie we have The November Man from one or the other of Bill Grange’s many interchangeable novels. I have always liked Pierce Brosnan. He made a completely serviceable Bond. It wasn’t his fault that the plots were more than usually absurd during his reign. Plus he’s a game likeable guy. Think of what a good sport he was in ‘Mama Mia’, and he famously adores his wife who looks just like a real person. It’s certainly no wonder that he and some producers have beheld with some chagrin that the ever expanding profitable market niche of ‘mature’ actor action movies with Stalone, the REDS movies and their ilk doesn't seem to include him. Naturally they’ve been giving an astonished side-eye to Brosnan’s contemporary Liam Neeson, who has created an entire cottage industry of creaky mature action. Brosnan should be the most credible of them all, and he almost is. This film is just not quite the vehicle though. Not that it matters really. The studio dumping it in the doldrums of the end of summer could still help him build a smallish franchise and maybe spend a little more money on the next one on a better director. For now though, The November Man is a film that just can’t seem to find its own tone. It goes veering wildly between a kind of louche foul mouthed ugliness and set pieces of shuddering repetitive if occasionally satisfying violence (shovel to the head, oh yeah!). It sometimes strikes a kind of soul searching philosophical note then simply throws up it’s hands and starts blowing stuff up again in an attempt to have it all. Then there is the young CIA protégé David Mason played by Luke Bracey (I just had to look up his name for the third time, he’s that forgettable); of all the handsome men flexing their way around the Hollywood casting couches certainly there had to be one less wooden - there must be. Ditto for Olga Kurylenko. It’s like they just didn’t care. Rent it maybe when it pops up in the RedBox because odds are we'll see more of this character again next summer anyway. |
Buy Tickets: http://www.fandango.com/thenovemberman_174358/movieoverview Rated: R Metacritic Score: 39 (ouch) http://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-november-man Rotten Tomatoes Rating: 34% (it’s not actually that bad) http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_november_man/ Official Site: http://www.thenovemberman.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NovemberManFilm Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheNovemberMan |
Life of Crime
Movie Tipper Rating: C
Movie Tipper Rating: C
This late summer caper movie is not a bad movie at all. It has many delights and if you have your own air conditioning you can just stream it (link below) and a good time, a little violent mayhem and some head scratching can be had by all. I’m not sure if the late, great Elmore Leonard wanted this treatment of his 1978 novel Switch to end up with a diverting almost cheerfully bumbling veneer, but he gave his imprimatur to the director Daniel Schechter’s script and he presumably watched Schecter’s witty, solid indi film Supporting Characters, and given that Leonard is gone now we will never know. The resulting film is (dare I say) almost cute. It seems lighthearted, but this being Leonardland we know that bad unforeseen extenuating circumstances are always just a plot about-face away. There’s lots and lots of snappy talk. The word ‘romp’ (not usually associated with Elmore Leonard) comes to mind even with Leonard’s patented Detroit style scum-bags and lowlifes, plotting twists and moments of unsettling venality. I liked Tim Robbins at his most drunk, self satisfied and delightfully sleazy. I liked the bungling extortionists and their endless darkly funny criminal patter. Yet somehow this is still not a top drawer effort among the many Elmore Leonard film adaptations. The very best thing is John Hawkes subtle checkered performance. He takes this film to another place all together, and for that you must watch it. Someday, someday soon, Hawkes will be in our Oscar conversations (not for this film of course), so keep an eye on him.
Oh! also if the names Ordell Robbie and Louis Gara ring a bell it is because they were first played by Samuel L. Jackson and Robert De Niro in Quentin Tarantino's Jackie Brown (my favorite Tarantino movie!) This movie is not a prequel in any sense, and really I would be hard pressed to imagine how the genial Ordell of this incarnation and Hawkes’ complex, tough and tender Louis could become the deadpanned psychos played by the older actors, still it’s fun to roll it around in your mind anyway. Of these four movies The Movie Tipper recommends that you stay home and stream this one.
Oh! also if the names Ordell Robbie and Louis Gara ring a bell it is because they were first played by Samuel L. Jackson and Robert De Niro in Quentin Tarantino's Jackie Brown (my favorite Tarantino movie!) This movie is not a prequel in any sense, and really I would be hard pressed to imagine how the genial Ordell of this incarnation and Hawkes’ complex, tough and tender Louis could become the deadpanned psychos played by the older actors, still it’s fun to roll it around in your mind anyway. Of these four movies The Movie Tipper recommends that you stay home and stream this one.
Stream it: http://www.amazon.com/Life-Of-Crime-Jennifer-Aniston/dp/B00N4OQU1M# (or on iTunes or lots of other places) Buy Tickets: http://www.fandango.com/lifeofcrime_168459/movieoverview Rated: R Metacritic Score: 59 (oh come on) http://www.metacritic.com/movie/life-of-crime Rotten Tomatoes Rating: 64% (not fair!) http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/life_of_crime_2013/ Official Site: http://lifeofcrimemovie.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lifeofcrime Twitter: https://twitter.com/lifeofcrime |
The Calling
Movie Tipper Rating: C
Movie Tipper Rating: C
Now for the late summer serial killer B movie we have The Calling. This movie definitely shares some DNA with various moody shambolic TV mysteries like The Killing and the lead character would have been right at home in Fargo (if Fargo was in Canada); then throw in a smattering of David Fincher’s Seven and you’ve got … bleh. What you have here is some religious murderous nuttery, some bloody snow and some serious questions as to why top-drawer A-list Academy Award winning actors like Susan Sarandon and Donald Sutherland or even B-lister Topher Grace are reduced to taking jobs like this at all. That’s the real mystery here. Actually, I would kinda like to see more of Sarandon’s Hazel, like in a series on TV of her own maybe (seriously) on Netflix, but The Calling is a slog folks.
Buy Tickets: http://www.fandango.com/thecalling_175290/movieoverview Digital (I recommend this option): https://itunes.apple.com/us/movie/the-calling/id894854865?ign-mpt=uo%3D4 Rated: R Metacritic Score: 46 http://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-calling Rotten Tomatoes Rating: 44% (::ouch::) http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_calling_2014/ Official Site: If there is one I can’t find it Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thecallingfilm Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheCallingMovie |
And So It Goes
Movie Tipper Rating: D
Movie Tipper Rating: D
And last but not by any means the least atrocious, in the role of late summer light comedy film, we have Rob Reiner's And So it Goes. In yet another supremely cynical movie business calculation this studio thought they might make a film for people who pretty much never to movies at all except to take their grandchildren. In fact Americans in their mid 60s don’t even do that all that much. Let’s just stipulate that this was a huge miscalculation. Speaking of mature this is Reiner definitely in late-career downhill slippage here, not to mention that the lauded screenwriter of As Good as it Gets (whose name I have mercifully forgotten) seems to have exactly one plot in his arsenal and here it is again. Rob Reiner even told an AOL interviewer that he tells “the same story over and over again” at different stages in his and his characters’ lives (no kidding). The word mawkish has had a good airing in critical circles over this film. It’s really something like Grumpy Old Man On Golden Pond if it were a sitcom, and believe me that is not a good thing. The question is; “Just exactly how horrendous can a movie be with Oscar winners Diane Keaton and Michael Douglas as its stars and a script by the co-writer of As Good as It Gets? The answer is too rude for me to reproduce here, it’s almost an achievement how tedious this movie is. Don’t even rent it for your grandparents.
Buy Tickets: http://www.fandango.com/andsoitgoes_173712/movieoverview Rated: PG Metacritic Score: 39 http://www.metacritic.com/movie/and-so-it-goes Rotten Tomatoes Rating: 17% (ok, that’s a tad harsh, but only a tad) http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/and_so_it_goes/ Official Site: http://andsoitgoesthemovie.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AndSoItGoesMovie Twitter: none (ha!) why bother |