Tag: Justin Kirk

Adam McKay shocked the world when in 2015 he moved away from his normal brand of movie directing, and instead gave us The Big Short. A true story, that is funny, terrifying, and well acted? What is this? The Big Short ended up being my favorite movie of the year when I made the list (but since then, I know for a fact that Steve Jobs is my real number one after a few years).

So the big question is, can he do it again?

This time his attempt is to go slightly further back in history and give us a movie about Dick Cheney. A hated, loved, and not fully understood politician who was Vice President under George W. Bush. Of course the title has a double meaning here, McKay is hoping to tell this story in a similar way. Narrator being a character, lot of various plot lines, and frankly, weird shit going on.

A funny movie, that is also maybe going to make you sad/angry/scared. Seems like a good idea for a slam dunk.

This is the face republicans will make watching this movie.

Dick (Christian Bale) grew up as the type of person who was going to go nowhere. He had a basic job, and spent most of his money getting drunk at night. This lead to some DUIs, barroom fights, the normal stuff. But his wife, Lynne (Amy Adams) wasn’t putting up with his basic bitch problems. She was still in her prime and could have any man. It was time for him to put up, or shut up, and save this marriage before it was too late.

And apparently, he still had some fight in him.

He eventually got himself a job as an intern in DC, where he met Donald Rumsfeld (Steve Carell), who was a big Republican at the time, and who knew how to play the game. Cheney quietly learned the same tricks and I do mean quietly. He wanted to have the power, without showing it off. He wanted to do without saying and just become great. He wanted to maybe become president one day, and every little bit was just a step along the way.

And Cheney also didn’t care what he had to do to get it. He learned of many legal loopholes about what the president can and cannot do, along with the vice president job. He became CEO of Halliburton, raised a lesbian daughter, and shot a guy in the face who later apologized for getting shot. He clearly is a man with a story, even if that story makes him out to be a total shit bag.

Also starring Alison Pill, Bill Camp, Don McManus, Eddie Marsan, Jesse Plemons, Justin Kirk, Lily Rabe, LisaGay Hamilton, and Sam Rockwell as George W., with Tyler Perry as Colin Powell.

Somewhere in there is Christian Bale.

Vice is a polarizing film because it goes hard after Dick. This is not remotely a fluff piece. He is the bad guy of this story. Even if you think it is going to talk about how he is a go-getter, who works hard. No, he is bad. A mastermind. Explicitly working to gain power regardless of precedent. Now, whether all of this is factual is the question. What matters is that a lot of it IS factual, even if the motivations we have to more guess about.

It also is extremely unique in its story telling, so much that the message can get easily lost. After all, there is a lot going on, and if you don’t believe anything happening, you might just call it a silly movie.

The acting is what we really have to talk about here. Bale completely transformed himself. Outside of young Cheney, he looks completely like a different person and it is easy to forget he is even inside that body. His transformation is this year’s Darkest Hour. Adams and Perry are limited in their roles, but do outstanding jobs. Carell has done better in other roles, but still carries his own weight here. Rockwell is a natural fit for George W. and should play that character more often.

Vice, on its own, is basically an insane film. It definitely isn’t as good as The Big Short (I think…?), but it is a film I feel like I need to see 2 or 3 times overall before I fully can grasp its scope. I am annoyed at myself for having to write this while only seeing it once. It is definitely going to be deserved of acting praise from Bale, but I am not sure what else it might walk away with for rewards.

Either way, McKay, hats off to you for trying new and polarizing work.

Aaron Sorkin Sorkin sorkin. If you would have told me he never directed a movie before I would have raised my finger in the air and declared “Oh no! He must have!” Sure he is known for being a writer and a great writer. But I just can’t imagine him never directing anything. Especially given the number of TV shows he has worked on.

But alas. The truth is sometimes hard to swallow, and usually that phrase is for much bigger events than this one.

Despite the fact that this is an original Sorkin directed film and of course, writer, it is unfortunately based on a true story. A true story that was written about in a book with the same name, Molly’s Game. And so even though he wrote the screenplay, he based it off of someone else’s words, and maybe the dialogue would be affected in some regards.

Or even worse, maybe Sorkin will get distracted by other things while having to direct as well.

Molly (Jessica Chastain) was very close to heading to the US Olympics as a downhill skier, doing the moguls. Her father (Kevin Costner) was an intense man, who wanted his kids to be athletes and great at school, constantly pushing them to achieve greatness at all costs. He was a bit of a dick. But Molly didn’t qualify due to a freak unlikely accident, and he life was forever changed.

Instead of the Olympics, Molly found herself putting off law school, living off of her friend’s couch until she found some job and some life experience. It led her to becoming the personal assistant of Dean King (Jeremy Strong), an asshole, a piece of shit, but she got money so whatever. This led her to running a weekly poker game he was hosting, which featured big celebrities, CEOs, high money people. It gave her a lot more in tips, so Molly began to learn the art of poker, about being a host, so that eventually she could do this on her own.

Thanks to the help of a mysterious celebrity (Michael Cera), eventually she got her foot in the door, ran a bigger game, with higher stakes, more tipping, and all legal. And yet, years later, she is arrested despite no games in a long time, with connections to mobsters, and she needs legal help to get her out of the jam (Idris Elba). Basically, a lot of shit is going down, we got flashbacks, we got a slight mystery, and we got sexy card game shenanigans and stories and gossip.

Also starring a ton of people, some playing unnamed celebrities, some CEOs, some attractive people in general. This includes Natalie Krill, Stephanie Herfield, Bill Camp, Madison McKinley, Justin Kirk, J.C. MacKenzie, Graham Greene, Chris O’Dowd, Angela Gots, and Brian d’Arcy James.

I’d let Idris Elba represent me in court, even if in real life he doesn’t know a damn thing.

Damn it, and now another recent movie has made me want to read the book. First Wonder, then The Disaster Artist, and now Molly’s Game. Although a little bit less interested in this book, as I feel like the movie must have done a great job of explaining the topic of the book. And I have fear that the narration of Molly’s Game, which is assumed to be book quotes, has been made better by Sorkin instead of left alone.

Not to mention I know that reading this book will not secretly identify any actors or celebrities who were parts of these games. These things were combed over by insiders already, and since I know jack shit outside of just movie gossip, I got absolutely nothing. Especially since this happened over a decade ago or whatever.

In terms of acting, Chastain does a really good job. She is powerful, assertive, and confident for the most part, a strong leading lady. Her cleavage plays a large role in this film as well, definitely important to the plot. Cleavage hasn’t been this important to a plot since Erin Brockovich, and this one is definitely more important. It deserves its own tag credit.

Elba is fine as the lawyer, given a lot more of the fun moments early on, and gets at least two great speeches near the end. The ending is where we get a lot more Sorkin level dialogue between the characters, especially between Chastain and Costner (who has done his best work in several years with this role).

Honestly, a fun story, it is gripping at times, it was very popular half a decade ago, yet still not quite big news. The only issues I probably have with it involve the direction. After the intro, which was wonderful, the story felt really weird. We had a lot of strange camera choices, fade overs, switching of timelines. It eventually started to come together, but it didn’t feel very coherent and great until after the poker games were already going.

Sorkin’s next film is called The Politician, also a true story. Huh, stories about the law and politics, this is strange new territory for Sorkin.

I don’t even remember why I first heard about Vamps. I think I heard it coming out to theaters, it never did, I was “sad”, then I moved on with my life as a normal human being.

But after watching Vamp U, I was trying to think of other shitty vampire movies. Holy crap, there is a lot of shitty vampire movie. Not even counting the Twilight Parodies, like Vampires Suck.

Thankfully I remembered it existed, and was able to rent it for like, a quarter or something. No one gave a fuck about this movie. I got the title though. Presumably, it is supposed to make you think of the word Tramps. If not, whoops, I am an asshole.

Well, you know. If the shoe fits.

Goody (Alicia Silverstone) and Stacy (Krysten Ritter) are two vampires living the high life in New York City. They love going tot he clubs, and spending their nights living it up. Why not, they are both roughly 20 year old girls, just looking for fun?

Well, Goody was bit in the 1800s by Cisserus (Sigourney Weaver), who later bite Stacy in the late 1980s. Big difference. But Goody doesn’t want it to be weird, so doesn’t tell Stacy that fact. They consider themselves to be ELFs, or Eternal Life Forms, vampire is tacky. They also don’t feed on human blood, it is not pleasant. Rat blood will do.

Goody gets worried when she finds out that if their creator ever dies, then they will revert back to their real age. Not a big deal for Stacy, but for Goody, that would end her life. Shit. This only matters because a Dr. Van Helsing (Wallace Shawn) is in town specifically to look for Cisserus. Shit.

To make matters worse, Stacy has fallen in love with a guy in her night class, Joey. JOEY VAN HELSING (Dan Stevens). He also may have made her pregnant. I won’t go into that.

Malcolm McDowell and Justin Kirk also play some pretty important vampires. Richard Lewis plays an ex lover of Goody’s from the 1960s who has returned into her life. Extra weird.

“Night, bitch. Let’s get some sausage. Blood sausage. And penis.”

Huh, this was directed and written by Amy Heckerling who brought us Clueless. Oh, how the mighty have fallen. That explains Silverstone and Shawn in the film, I guess.

I will say that the movie got better as time went on, up until the end. The beginning was shit right off the back, but eventually it found its footing. It is a shame the ending was just super tacky and not really exciting in any way.

The film is meant to be comedic, but everything basically falls flat. They go for the easy puns and small references, but nothing is able to stick.

Finally, the acting is just ugh. Ugh and a half. I strive for descriptive descriptions here. Krysten Ritter might be one of the worst actresses out there today. Stop giving her roles. They are bad.

Join me next week, when I somehow find another shitty vampire movie to get disgruntled over.

Entirely my fault, but as soon as I started to watch this movie, I was immediately disappointed.

I saw L!fe Happens in the RedBox, and was like, “HOLY SHIT THE GOOCH IS STARRING IN A MOVIE GO GO GO GO GOGOGOGOGOGOGO!”

Well it’s not The Gooch. It is just Krysten Ritter, who always reminds me of The Gooch. Except for when I started to watch Don’t Trust the Bitch in Apartment 23. I started that show because I thought it was Christina Ricci.

Basically, I have no idea who this fucking woman is.

The story begins with Deena (Kate Bosworth) and Kim (Ritter) really wanting to have sex. They are roomies, you see, and actually both brought a guy home! But they can’t find any damn condoms. Well, one, and Deena claims it. A year later, Kim has a child. Max, aww.

They also have a third roommate, Laura (Rachel Bilson) but she is a virgin and that’s all she brings to the table in the movie. I guess as a sort of opposite to the main two?

Anyways, the baby daddy (Rhys Coiro) doesn’t want to be a dad, so she is basically on her own. She pushes her baby on other people, like her dad, and roommates, because she still feels the need to party and feels like she deserves it. She also ends up falling for some Nicholas dude (Geoff Stults) and tells him the baby belongs to her roommate. That’s a good start to a relationship.

So now she is all lying it up, and constantly trying to make her friends help her out. They don’t like that, or the lies. Hey, Jason Biggs and Justin Kirk are also in this. Hooray~.

Um. Uhhh. Just hanging out ladies? That’s cool. Stop staring at me.

Turns out there is not much to say about this film. It was just terrible. Characters aren’t really likable, story is boring, there aren’t really any funny moments. It literally has nothing going on for it. So little that I can’t even make a good joke about it.

I mean. Fuck. Why would you do this to me, movie people? Such a boring lame movie? I trusted you, and you just poked me in the eye. Twice. The same eye. I mean, it is nice of them to not do one poke per eye, or else I’d be blind, but the second poke on an already poked eye is basically pointless.

Nevermind, if an eye poke was pointless, it probably wouldn’t actually be a poke, would it?