Tag: Bobby Cannavale

Danny Collins is a movie that sort of just sneaked into theaters. It wasn’t heavily advertised, it didn’t have more than 1 screening, and I honestly had never heard of it.

I might have even watched it when it came out, if it didn’t come out against Insurgent. Come on. Teen high school dystopian dramas > everything, am I right?

My biggest concern for this movie is actually Al Pacino, once a great actor, now a guy in a lot of bad movies, like Jack and Jill and Stand Up Guys. He is becoming a bit of a box office turn off for me, just like Robert De Niro. For the most part, they seem to be just showing up to do their scenes and not putting any heart to it, getting their easy pay checks. That is the one thing I will mostly look for in this film. Can Pacino try harder?

This guy fucks.

Danny Collins (Pacino) used to be a big star. He was wildly famous in the 70s, with lyrics that compared to John Lennon and he was on top of the world. Now, 40 years later, he is still rich and famous and touring, but playing all of his old hits to old fans and kind of just going with the motions and never giving it his all. Huh, sounds a lot like something I talked about not to long ago.

Either way, his long time manager Frank (Christopher Plummer) let’s him know for his birthday that he found a 40 year old letter, written to him by John Lennon that never made it to him. A letter that basically would have changed his life and told him that money and fame aren’t everything. Well fuck, now he is old and feels useless. But there is still a chance. He should just leave his young cheating wife (Katarina Cas), check himself into a hotel and no longer worry about music but instead worry about his life.

So he is going to live in a Hilton hotel, to constantly hit on their manager (Annette Bening), and try to hook up the main receptionist (Melissa Benoist, who is in everything now) and the main valet (Josh Peck). But that isn’t his main goal, no of course not! He actually has a son, Tom (Bobby Cannavale, who is in everything now), whom he has a rocky relationship with. So he wants to fix that up real soon before someone dies and ruins it all. This means he also will have to befriend his wife (Jennifer Garner) and finally meet his granddaughter (Giselle Eisenberg).

Good. A man with a mission. A man who might go back to money fame drugs and playing for old people if he can’t fix his real life before it is too late. Also featuring Brian Smith as a booty call, and Nick Offerman, who has like, a minute of screen time only at the start, but looks cool enough to mention in this review.

At least the casting department got something right. Cannavale could totally be Pacino’s son.

There you go Al Pacino! If you play a part that in some way mirrors your own career for the last five years, you might put some effort into it!

From Pacino I saw passion and I saw an actor who cared about playing his character. Great! And his own enthusiasm made me enjoy the performance and overall, enjoy the movie.

I thought the relationship aspects between Collins and his family felt realistic and avoided tons of cliches. The most unfortunate part about the family was Jennifer Garner though, who had a character that didn’t do a whole lot in the film, so it felt odd for someone of her talent to be used in such a way. This happens a lot with the mom role in films, for whatever reason, but since they had her, one would guess her role would be more substantial.

I was also very impressed with Bening, playing a hotel manager or something. She was able to pull off the professional/dealing with a huge celebrity/not caring about said celebrity really well. And of course, Cannavale was great for many reasons as well.

Danny Collins, a movie that I was afraid would be a bad VH1 made for TV movie, ended up having quite a few strong characters and a unique enough plot to really enjoy. Based loosely off of a real story, but I don’t care about that story, so I didn’t feel like talking about it.

Every few months, a new indie movie starring a few people from popular TV shows comes out and we are supposed to watch it, eventually, on our own time. Because these movies rarely hit theater and are more of a VOD type situation.

The good and bad news with these sorts of movies is that they are non consistently bad, average, or good, but all over the map so you never know what to expect. Last year we got Drinking Buddies staring that girl from House and that dude from New Girl, and it sucked. But we also got The One I Love starring that girl from Mad Men and that guy from The League, and that one rocked.

So how will Adult Beginners go? The one starring the other guy from The League and the guy from Community and the girl from 30 Rock? Well, anything goes in TV star VOD movie land!

“Ugh, more people from The League? I would not watch that movie.”

Jake (Nick Kroll) is going to make a shit ton of money. And with his money and your money and everyone else’s money put together, he is going to make a shit ton more and make everyone rich. And maybe even make them a little bit sexy. But then something goes wrong, right away with his company, and sure enough, he loses everyone’s money. He is now broke and useless and his friends hate him. Even Hudson (Joel McHale) hates him a bit.

So now Jake is homeless and alone, so he decides to go move in with his sister, Justine (Rose Byrne). He hasn’t seen her in a couple years because he has been “busy” so sure, it is a bit awkward. You know, cause he son is like, 2 or 3 now. And she is pregnant again! And he barely even knows her husband, Danny (Bobby Cannavale). He just knows it is a hectic time in their lives. Unfortunately, the only way they let him live with him long term is if he basically becomes their full time nanny, so they both can work and save up money for new baby and maybe a new house!

Jake of course is an irresponsible adult, and doesn’t know anything about kids. But he accepts, mostly because he has nothing else he can do at that point.

And that is about it. Jake needs to learn how to be an adult, for real. He is a beginner at being an adult. He also can’t swim. Jane Krakowski is a swimming teacher for adults and babies and dances with babies in water. It isn’t super weird, don’t worry. And Jason Mantzoukas is in here, because he is crazy and Nick Kroll’s friend.

“I didn’t invite Jason, did you invite Jason?”
“No I didn’t invite Jason, did you invite Jason, Nick?”
“Yeah I totally did, suck it.”

Rose Byrne is becoming a relatively big name now, which is great for her. She is appearing in all the genres right now: Horror, Drama, Comedy, Action and generally being great in each one of those roles. Most surprising is comedy because it seemingly came out of nowhere with Neighbors. The problem with Adult Beginners is it is one of those classic comedies that doesn’t end up being actually funny.

Hopefully the positive buzz that has surrounded Spy is enough to make everyone ignore this movie. Ignoring it shouldn’t be an issue, because no one will really watch it when it is VOD. I just want to make sure her career is not affected by the dullness of this film.

As for everyone else? Cannavale is a likable dude, even if he always plays mostly douche-y characters, but he hasn’t had any nice break outs yet. Likewise, Kroll always plays douches, but occasionally has comedic sparks that do not go on display during this movie.

A comedy that doesn’t end up being funny, with serious moments that also aren’t too dramatic or emotional. Yep, this is a classic indie film in that regard, which most of the time would garner a 2 out of 4 or something, but they usually have one or two unique moments in them to warrant a bump. I am willing to say Adult Beginners offers nothing new and leaves me with a bored taste on my mouth.

In case you are curious, boring taste is like cardboard.

Welcome back to Musical Week!

The realest reason for Musical Week is that this December had two musicals coming out only a week apart, which meant I only had to find 3 more. Into The Woods was yesterday, and Annie is today!

When I first heard there was an Annie remake, I was mostly indifferent. I didn’t know if we needed a new one, but hey okay. But when I heard she wouldn’t be a tap dancing ginger, but a BLACK GIRL? I was still mostly indifferent. At least there was a change for the remake so that it wasn’t just rehashed material. It would allow them to do a more modern version, not one set in the way back early times.

But then I saw the first trailer. I knew something was weird and different and off from it. And it is an unfortunate change. But one I will clickbait tactic and wait to talk about at the end of the review.

And it isn’t just that when I do this dance, I always look like I have to take a pouty poop.

Little Orphan Annie (Quvenshane Wallis). No, wait, fuck that. She is just a foster kid, not an orphan. She has parents, she just doesn’t know who they are or when they will be back for her. She just knows that maybe, one day, she will see them on a Friday night at a local Italian restaurant eating cannolis.

But while being chased one day by some jerks, she falls in the street and almost gets run over! But thankfully, a man is there to pick her up and chastise her. That man is Will Stacks (Jamie Foxx), the owner of a NYC based phone company that is hugely successful, so he is totally rich, and he is also running for mayor! He isn’t doing that great though. He is super behind. Well, footage goes out of him saving Little Foster Girl Annie on the internets, which gives him a bump up. His campaign manager (Bobby Cannavale) convinces him that if he temporarily takes Annie in and make him seem more charitable.

Annie is a free going individual who understands this is just for publicity, and she is cool with that. Getting to live in a rich house for a few weeks? Hells yeah. She doesn’t want him for a dad anyways, she wants her real parents, who will totally come eventually. Maybe tomorrow even. Or the tomorrow after that.

What could go wrong? Also featuring Rose Byrne, Cameron Diaz, David Zayas, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, and Stephanie Kurtzuba.

No, trust me, I counted them. Definitely 76 trombones.

Let’s talk about…pop music. Some of it is good, a lot can be bad, even more of it is catchy. That is what this version of Annie is, for the most part. Just pop music broadway. And that is my major complaint. The songs don’t feel as natural as musicals usually strive for. It didn’t have that extra bellow or personality behind the notes that made me care about the lyrics and not just nod my head to a tune. Kids in general like all kinds of music, so a different sound to all of the sounds doesn’t feel warranted.

This is the second thing I have seen Wallis in, the first being Beasts Of Southern Wild, which I kind of hated. She is fine as Annie. She really is. She has charisma and she is charming and she carries that strong independent feeling with her the whole movie.

Everyone else? Ehhh. Byrne did decent. Diaz only annoyed me.

And Foxx. Come on, Foxx. I know you can sing. I remember Gold Digger quite vividly. Was your role in that song fake? I am starting to believe it. You had passion in your lines and feeling in your voice. Every song with Jaime Foxx is terrible. His voice is ridiculously soft for most of them, so I felt like I had to strain to hear him and there is just nothing of substance behind any of them. I kind of felt he was just talking his lines. Maybe they accidentally put in the mumble take? They are just down right terrible.

But you know what bugs me the most? The finale, when they re-did Tomorrow? Despite how terrible I thought the music was in the movie and thus how bad the movie was, it still made me tear up. Just a little bit. Great lyrics can do that. Balloons help.

So who is to blame for this? Will Smith and Jay-Z. They are producers, must be their fault.

I had the unfortunate bad luck to miss Chef when it first hit theaters in May this year. I was living in a place that didn’t get too many limited releases, and once I moved to a place with them, it had already left most theaters, or was still an hour away. So it took a lot longer than I would have liked, but at least I beat the DVD release. Aka, getting to see it when it was hitting the cheater theater cycle.

The reason I really wanted to see it is that in a summer with so many giant block busters, the trailer made this one seem a lot more realistic and honest. It also helps that it secretly had a lot of actors I enjoyed, many of which who had starred in big block busters.

Not to mention I heard it was a movie about cooking, where they actually featured a lot of cooking. Not calling out any names or anything.

Hey! A kid too! This would appeal to the Disney crowd! That and the heavy cursing!

This is a movie about Carl Casper (Jon Favreau) who has been cooking food longer than some people have been alive. Hell, I have been writing reviews longer than some people have been alive. If anyone is younger than this website and reading it, congrats, you are very advanced for your age. He has been working at the same restaurant for awhile too, under the owner Riva (Dustin Hoffman). They have butt heads a lot recently, Carl wanting to constantly change the menu and experiment and Riva thinking that people come in expecting a certain taste. Carl wants to change the menu because famed LA food critic Ramsey Michel (Oliver Platt) is coming in to give them a new rating.

Well, when everything starts to not go as planned and Carl seems to get angry at everyone he needs a change of pace and stat. His ex wife (Sofia Vergara) keeps telling him he should start a food truck so he can be his own boss. He just has to borrow money from her ex husband before him (Robert Downey Jr.). Jeez. But hey, if he goes somewhere new, his old line cook Martin (John Leguizamo) promised to join him. And if the food truck can bring him closer to his son (Emjay Anthony), as the two have drifted over the years, then it is even better.

He just has to first figure out how to use the dang internet and that twitter thing, and figure out why everyone is so interested in his truck in the first place. Also a wild Scarlett Johansson and Bobby Cannavale appear, so they should be noted too.
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“What the fuck is the internet?“

Despite knowing a little bit about the movie, I still found this movie to be full of surprises. Some big names have pretty small roles in the movie and some of the character choices were surprising, even by the ending. But in the end, really, it is a movie about following your dreams, family, and food.

It actually took me a little bit to recognize Sofia Vergara in that her voice wasn’t completely exaggerated like it must be in Modern Family. Jon Favreau when he was wearing the bandanna looked like The Amazing Johnathan which was just weird. John Leguizamo I had to assume was actually Michael Pena because Leguizamo hasn’t been in anything great since…well, almost forever.

Speaking of food. This movie features a lot of food, a bit more varied early on pre-food truck, but darn it, they show a lot of food prep and more importantly people eating it. Which is important in this genre.

It was all decently funny and cute at the same time. There weren’t any hugely dramatic or crazy moments happening throughout, just an appropriate sequence events after the critic bundle early on. That was refreshing. A lot more comedies rely on outrageous antics to carry the plot, but this one keeps it relatively simple.

Overall, Chef is clearly the best cooking related movie of this year so far.

Pornography!

Sex!

Clitoris in the neck!

No, I am not just doing all that to increase traffic. I am hear to talk about Lovelace, the true story of Linda Lovelace, who starred in Deep Throat and helped changed the porno world forever. Kind of.

I also just realized that Lovelace is also the name of the Guru penguin in Happy Feet. Huh, I hope there is no connection.

This Lovelace doesn’t share the same talent. He can’t with that plastic around his neck!

Linda (Amanda Seyfried) USED to be such a sweet little girl. She used to to dance and go to school, and obey her parents! Her parents (Sharon Stone, Robert Patrick), mind you, are the type who would scold her just for sunbathing in a bikini in her own fenced in back yard.

While Go-Go dancing with her friend, Patsy (Juno Temple), they meet up with Chuck (Peter Sarsgaard), who will change her life forever. See, Chuck sees something special in her. He sees a beauty that can go far, do great things, and maybe even make a lot of money. Mmm, money.

After helping slowly tear away her inhibitions, he is even able to make her go down on him, despite her initial embarrassment. Wouldn’t you know it, it turns out that she doesn’t have a gag reflex, and has a unique talent in the industry. I don’t even know why I am being subtle.

Well, they need money, and she gets put into the lead role of an X-Rated feature, Deep Throat. It has comedy and it has something people haven’t really seen before, so it becomes a huge hit, making millions world wide, and catapulting Linda into a spotlight she could never before imagine. But a life of fame is always not something you want, especially if it comes at such high costs. Such as being married to Chuck, an abusive husband who takes all of your money, beats you, and gives you emotional scarring for years with no place to turn to.

Ah yes, the Linda Lovelace story, one of porn, and one of abuse.

Hank Azaria, Bobby Cannavale, and Chris Noth play “industry” people, and James Franco has a small cameo as a much younger Hugh Hefner.

This is all you are getting out of me, you creepy internet people you.

Linda’s story is definitely a sad one. It is a story that should be heard so that women out there no that dangerous things CAN happen, signs to look for, and how to get out of those situations and find the help you need.

Unfortunately, Lovelace seems to almost downplay the amount of abuse she actually receives. I found that portion of the movie to be far too short. It needed to be longer to really experience how a large portion of her life was, before she was finally able to get police intervention. Her story was a powerful enough one to write a book about and have restocking issues due to its popularity.

I think the movie has its heart in the right place, but fails to deliver the right emotions that one should expect from this picture. There are two important parts to this story. Linda’s transformation into a porn icon, and the abuse she took from someone she thought loved her. This definitely seems to care more about the former, and not the latter, which is a shame.

Woody Allen sure is an interesting man. He is now 77 years old (This is a 2013 review, for you future readers ten-twenty years from now), and still churning out interesting and diverse movies. I personally find it hard to watch some of his films, usually the overly romantic ones. I have rented You Will Meet A Tall Dark Stranger now twice, and you know, still haven’t seen it. Very apathetic.

So while the trailer for Blue Jasmine didn’t appeal to me right away, I went anyways, because it is easy to finally see something if you pay money and sit in a public room with others.

Ah, bliss. Being rich. Not love.

Jasmine (Cate Blanchett) has recently left her husband. Hal (Alec Baldwin) was a real estate tycoon in NYC, who was into some shady tactics. Eventually he got arrested, and so all of their wealth was frozen and taken by the government. Shady shit. Jasmine was left with nothing thanks to this, so she is moving to San Francisco to live with her sister and her kids.

Her Sister, Ginger (Sally Hawkins) is also recently divorced. Her former husband Augie (Andrew Dice Clay) seems to be in a rough shape, with most of their money “stolen” by Hal and Jasmine, apparently. But Ginger says family is family, and even if Jasmine wasn’t really there for her at all throughout her wealth, she would be with her now. Ginger is now dating (Bobby Cannavale), who looks like a younger, funnier version of Hal. He wants to move in with her, but now Jasmine is there. Ugh.

Jasmine has a “plan”. She wants to go back to school to finish her degree, but she has no money. So she found out she can take interior decorator classes online, clearly her forte, but she also doesn’t know anything about computers. So she will have to take a class on that. Jeez. She also has to find some horribly job, possibly serving others, in order to help buy food, rent, and classes. Life is horrible.

Jasmine is in a rough time of her life, yet she also still feels above even the smallest of tasks. Will she be able to get back on her feet through hardwork and dedication, or will she get lucky again?

Also starring Louis CK and Peter Sarsgaard, but I don’t want to tell you who.

I bet Louis CK said yes to this role as soon as he found out Woody Allen was calling.

Cate Mother Fucking Blanchett. She is in a lot of things, and is often considered a great actress. This is by far the best performance I have ever seen her give. Really fantastic. This is (in August) the best performance by a lead actress I have seen all year, so right now I have to assume she is going to win an Oscar for her role. Seriously. Just seriously. Fucking fantastic. I can’t even describe how great she did at this role.

I am not sure what is psychologically wrong with her character. Maybe she is a sociopath before the divorce, but afterwards (/during it) she seems to have a nervous breakdown, which messes her up for most of the movie. Talking to herself, having an inability to relate to any other person or her own situation, it is just out of control. But Cate Blanchett owns that role.

I am also impressed with Andrew Dice Clay, who had to play a purely dramatic emotional role. I like that Bobby Cannavale is basically a younger looking Dice Clay, it says a lot about the sister character, without using any actual words.

Overall, this movie is incredibly depressing and at some points heart warming. But that is great, given its drama category. I was able to laugh occasionally, but those moments weren’t the main focus. The arguments between couples felt real, and it made it almost painful to watch. I also like that the story was broken back and forth from “now” and pre-marriage.

My biggest problem with this movie is that in the second half it feels very repetitive. Arguments and dialogue repeat themselves pretty often, despite the ever advancing story.

Outside of those gripes, this movie ended up being way better than I expected, and I find myself against surprised at what Woody Allen can do.

I miss sexy movie titles. Just a last name (or even a full name) are boring titles. They don’t even say anything about the movie unless you already know the character they are based on. Parker is actually not the first time this character has been in film. At least five other movies have featured Parker as the main character, based around the crime novels by Donald Westlake/Richard Stark, but most of them at least have interesting titles.

On an unrelated note, I am a little bit interested in the movie Bullet To The Head.” I bet you can figure out why.

Because Stallone wont be attempting to be a British man faking a Texas accent.

Parker (Jason Statham) is just your ordinary crook with a few simple rules. Don’t hurt anyone innocent, don’t steal from those who can’t afford it. That usually means organizations with insurance, and the money goes to himself, so don’t consider him a Robin Hood character. His girlfriend (Emma Booth) knows all about it, because her father (Nick Nolte) is an ex partner of his, who now just sets up criminals for bigger scores.

Which of course he does with Parker and another group of guys. Robbing the Ohio State Fair, a score of about a million dollars, $200k each. Pretty solid. But it turns out the other four members of the crew (Michael Chiklis, Wendell Pierce, Clifton Collins Jr., Micah A. Hauptman) have their eyes set on a bigger prize. Another job for five people, worth millions, but they need some start up cash first, all of what they just got.

Well, they are vague, Parker says no, they try to kill him and run away. But of course he doesn’t die. That would be a sad and short movie. So he creates a new identity, and heads off to West Palm Beach to stop the guys who tried to kill them by killing them first, and of course getting his money back. Shouldn’t be too hard. After all, Jennifer Lopez plays a real estate workers strapped for cash, being chased romantically by a local cop (Bobby Cannavale). Parker basically has his own small army with J-Lo!

Too bad it will take at least 3 small armies to remove his grimace.

The previews for Parker make it seem like a giant revenge action flick. A crime occurs, guy gets wronged, he goes back for vengeance. If anything, it was the exact opposite. Yes, the heist goes off and he gets wronged, but he doesn’t start killing all the people involved on a warpath. No, he has to plan it all first. Here is where my brain starts to get all weird.

I like that it is planned, that the movie looks before leaping and sets everything up first. That way we get to see how smart our main character is! Smart and his great ability to survive despite all these injuries. But then it became too detailed, and a little bit boring. Honestly, after the two hour movie, I had felt like I was in the theater for four hours. It is hard to describe, but things definitely go way too slow.

It didn’t help that watching every little step of his recovery/run/planning made me  hate the Parker character. Apparently Parker hates people who break his rules and his creed! Well, so much for the stealing only from those who can afford it. It was almost comical, watching him steal car after car, location to location, without actually knowing anything about the owners of any of them. His creed didn’t mean a dang thing when it actually mattered.

His actions ruin the image of the charismatic thief for me, just a bit. Compiled with the snail crawl of the film makes it hard to recommend to anyone.

The thing I love most about Movie 43 is how easy it will be to review.

I mean, part of the point is not knowing much about the movie ahead of time before you see it. So I don’t have describe all the skits, just the main plot that tries to hold it all together.

Shit yeah! Oh, and so many tags. I am gonna tag the shit out of this movie.

I don’t have any obligation to tell you what Halle Berry is going to do with that Turkey Baster!

So here is the basic story, which is a piece of shit excuse to give you this movie. Sorry, that sounds negative. The point of this movie is a series of short skits all put together, that is all. Trying to put a plot behind them all? Probably won’t work well, but it technically gets to be the movie plot.

A crazy asshole (Dennis Quaid) is having a meeting with some big movie executive (Greg Kinnear). Why? You know fucking why, to sell a movie of course. Greg doesn’t like it, the movie is vulgar and bad, but when a gun is brought into the equation, maybe he will listen. Also featuring Will Sasso and Common.

What vulgar skits? We got Hugh Jackman and Kate Winslet on a blind date, where Hugh is basically perfect. Liev Schreiber and Naomi Watts are homeschooling their kid, Jeremy Allen White, and trying to give him the realest depressing experience ever.

Anna Faris wants Chris Pratt to poop on her. Kieran Culkin and Emma Stone are awkward.

Richard Gere doesn’t understand why people are sticking their dicks in the iBabe, nor does Jack McBrayer the scientist. Only person who gets it is Kate Bosworth.

There is a speed dating convention in the DC universe, with Justin Long, Jason Sudeikis, Uma Thurman, Bobby Cannavale, Kristen Bell, and Leslie Bibb all playing parts.

Jimmy Bennett is on a “Date” with Chloe Grace Moretz, who gets her period, and the older brother Christopher Mintz-Plasse freaks out. Seann Williams Scott is mad at his best friend Johnny Knoxville, but to make it up for him, he found a leprechaun (Gerard Butler).

Am I almost done? Fuck no!

Halle Berry and Stephen Merchant are on a blind date playing truth or dare! Terrence Howard says the same joke about black people and basketball over and over!

BUT JUST YOU WAIT. THERE IS ONE MORE SCENE. AFTER THE CREDITS.

I was surprised too. Because this scene didn’t have any previews in the trailers. So I will just say Elizabeth Banks and Josh Duhamel.

Just seeing all those links man. It makes me dizzy.

Maybe I talked about the skits too much, maybe I didn’t. But basically all I mentioned was information you can learn in the trailer, which is unfortunately a lot of it. Problem is, some of the better jokes I already knew were coming and it ruined it a bit for me. I knew about most of the Home School scene, but I still thought it was one of the better ones. Poop quest ended up being better than advertised as well. My favorite scene, however, was the Batman based speed dating, but that could just be because I am a comic nerd. Either way, Jason Sudeikis made that scene his bitch, and I want more of that.

The movie started pretty uncomfortably too, with the blind date scene. No one really laughed right away at the sight gag, but eventually they just threw it in our face enough that it became funny.

I understand the movies only purpose is to do outrageous things, without a plot, but I am upset about the main story line. I hated how it ended. Pretty much a cop out. Even more strange is that only the American version features Quaid and company. Apparently international versions star three unknown kids searching the internet for a fabled movie and finding these clips. Pretty dang weird.

Yeah, most of it is dumb ass jokes, but eventually you just have to give in or else you will have a bad time. Easier to accept the laughs than to ignore them.

Unfortunately, it is still a pretty shit film, in the grand scheme of things. So there you go! Maybe watch with the buds eventually, while drinking, when it is rentable. That would be a better idea.