Tag: RomCom

Clearly, it took me a long, long time to watch Killers. Like three years is forever in movie years.

But why? Well, the trailers made it look super un-interesting. So that is a downer. Second, it stars That guy who I only liked in One Movie. (But to be fair, I tend to dislike most of the cast of That ’70s Show in movies)

And it came out around the same time as Knight and Day, a “similar themed movie” which I loved. A lot. But I bought Killers anyways, knowing one day I would just have to suck it up and watch the dang movie.

There is nothing you can really do to make me look at him and think Action Star.

Spencer Aimes (Ashton Kutcher) is not your ordinary dream boat, apparently. No, he is some sort of spy/assassin, but he wants to get out of the game. Good timing really, because he is in Nice, France at the same time that Jen Kornfeldt (Katherine Heigl) is, along with her parents (Tom Selleck, Catherine O’Hara).

But he wants to give it up, and now seems like a good time. He also runs into Jen and they start to hit it off quickly, while both hiding some secrets. Oh well.

Good news, they hit it off, and three years later, they are living together and everything is fantastic! Except, maybe Spencer’s boss never really accepted his resignation? Maybe he still expects him to help out? For whatever reason, the boss contacts him in this trying moments, where Jen thinks he is getting bored with their relationship and cheating on him. Next thing you know, one of Spencer’s friends is trying to kill him.

What?? For some reason, a $20 million bounty has been placed on his head. Shit. Now all these assholes are coming around trying to get their kill money on, which means he for sure has to tell Jen about his past.

The rest of the cast is full of cameos, of their friends, and coworkers, some of which might be other assassins sent to kill Spencer, some of which might be just actual friends. Who knows?! They include Rob Riggle, Usher, Katheryn Winnick, Casey Wilson, Lisa Ann Walter and Kevin Sussman.

Nope. Gun doesn’t help either.

Good news, the plot wasn’t what ruined the movie!

No, the plot ended up being okay. Not knowing who from your friends and family might be assassins sent to collect on a bounty? Leaves for a lot of potential action and comedy, not to mention improvised weapons.

Katherine Heigl wasn’t bad in this movie either. She played her role well. I couldn’t believe Kutcher at all, but I made that obvious. Selleck was nice too.

What kind of killed it for me is how long it took to get to the assassins, friend or foe, oh god danger, part. I think it was about 45/50 minutes into the movie. That is far too long! What was going on before that? A bunch of gossip, some love stuff, typical romcom secretive bull crap. Yawn yawn.

Because the second half was actually a bit entertaining, minus the extreme miscast of Kutcher. Maybe he could have been in the first half, and then they could have secretly replaced him with Gerard Butler for the second half. A man who is getting put into romcoms, despite only being great at action and musicals.

Oh well. I think I only spent a few bucks on this movie anyways.

Fish movies! Oh the fish movies!

Okay, I am kind of bullshitting here. After all, I only know of one other fish movie that came out anywhere near this one, and that was The River Why. Very, very hipster. That was a boy’s coming of age story, who just really liked fishing and wanted to fish like a real man. Or something.

So Salmon Fishing On The Yemen is probably similar.

Wait a minute. This title is weird. “The Yemen”. There is no river called that. What the hell. Do they just mean in Yemen? I wouldn’t say “Salmon Fishing In The Italy”. Don’t be weird, movie titles.

I can’t tell who is the expert here.

Oh wait a minute. Yemen is all in the Middle East (kind of). I see now. There is no salmon in Yemen! That is a big problem I guess, but one this movie plans to over come.

Sheikh Muhammed (Amr Waked) is a prince and he loves fishing, and wants to fish at his home in Yemen. So he contacts the UK to see if it can be done. This means they have to make a river, and introduce salmon, and hope they can live and breed there without it being too much of a problem.

The UK are interested in helping too, because any news with the middle east that has nothing to do with war can only be good. So they get Harriet (Emily Blunt) who is some political underling in the UK to get it started. So she goes to the fisheries department. Who else would know what to do? There she finds Dr. Alfred Jones (Ewan McGregor), world renounced Salmon expert and fisherman and lure-maker.

But he says no.

That idea is dumb.

Or maybe it is crazy enough to work? Doesn’t matter. His job is now on the line to at least try. Bah.

Then some romance happens (Which is bad, because he has a boyfriend in the military Tom Mison) and a lot of politics. Do they succeed at building a river, shipping ten thousand fish over, and having them survive, without pissing off Yemen locals and environmental group? Welllll…. Also featuring Kristin Scott Thomas as even higher up official in the UK!

There are few things I love more than adultery. Unfortunately, one of those things is not cheating and stable relationships.

Haha! Ha ha ha! See what I did there? [Future readers will note the posting date].

Because of the really fucking large cast of New Year’s Eve, I decided that all of my tags will not list the actor name in parenthesis like normal, just tag the character. You can see the name if you hover your mouse though. That will make it at least a small mystery, if you don’t care. Maybe fuck with you a bit. After all, something needs to make it more interesting.

Except for Ryan Seacrest. He only plays himself, always and forever. Just like Bloomberg.

YEAH ITS NEW YEAR’S EVE IN NEW YORK CITY. Time to party! Well, maybe. People gotta work, shit is still going down.

Like hospitals! Turns out people still are giving birth. But did you know at this specific NYC hospital, they have decided to give away a $10,000 prize to the couple who birthed the first baby of the new year. One Man/woman couple has been planning this out for months. The other man/woman just found out about it today. Who can push out a baby first? Also, doctors. They are a thing.

The opposite of babies is happening, people are getting old and dying. Like that one old guy. His doctor doesn’t know if he will make it to the new year. He might though, hopefully the daughter will make it in time. But until then, a nurse shall keep him company, despite her own “Date” that night to worry about.

One woman is fed up with the holiday mess. She has a boss who sucks, and wont give her time off despite already promising it. So she quits, and really wants to complete all the resolutions she made last year before the new year. Well, its impossible. But she gets a courier to help her anyways.

The courier’s sister is having problems with her daughter, who really wants to go out to times square for new years. The courier’s friend is jaded about new years, after a bad break up the previous year. He gets stuck on an elevator with an uppity girl, who really needs to get to times square for her job. What job? Back up singer to Jensen, huge celebrity who is performing on the main stage!

Turns out he only agreed to do this job, to get closer to an ex girlfriend of his. She runs a catering business, and demanded that she cater the very fancy party. Pretty sneaky sis. Too bad he also has to deal with very busty fan girls.

One man just watched his last single friend get married. He is the last one! But no worries, he has to go to NYC tonight anyways to do a speech for his work. Good year or something. But last year he met the woman of his dreams, just didn’t get her name. Will she be at the location that she promised to be at a year later? Just who is she?

But lastly, when you think of NYC NYE, you think of the ball drop. Someone has to run that thing, damn it. The woman in charge is on her first year, and is good friends with the head of police too. But there is an issue. The only way to fix it is to call back a fabled old mechanic, who they fired earlier in the year. Whoops. Awkward.

Nothing says a new year, like Ashton Kutcher, right?

I can honestly say that I found basically none of these plot lines that interesting. That seems like a big problem. Unlike Valentine’s Day, which had some storylines that I enjoyed (and still need to review!), this one had nothing for me. Shit, I also have to review New York, I Love You, another similar movie (Except rated R).

The best part of the movie for me is that I got paid $18 to have it. My first copy didn’t work, got it exchanged at Wal-Mart, they messed up the return (Which I pointed out), but laziness occurred, an I profited. Hey, that’d be reason enough to give a 4 out of 4 in my book. More people should give me money to own a movie.

Playing For Keeps is a popular phrase, and it happens to be one of my favorites thanks to “Talladega Nights“. Just yelling “I play for keeps!” at someone in an argument makes it all the more exciting somehow. It might also diffuse the argument completely into laughter. Win win right there.

Gerard Butler, fresh off of his last box office bomb Chasing Mavericks is hoping that he can, you know, make a movie that turns a profit for once in the last five years.

Spoilers: This is an even bigger let down.

George Dwyer (Butler) used to be somebody, he used to be a contender. He was a great soccer star in Europe, but got injured and had to leave the game. Some how during that, he also lost his wife (Jessica Biel) and son Lewis (Noah Lomax), moved to Canada to open up a bar and do real estate. Yeah, that makes sense.

But after some time, he lost it all again, and moved to Virginia to reunite with his son! Too bad “the man” has got him down, he owes a lot of money, and can’t get a job. He wants to be a sports caster, and wants his son to love him. So why not become the local AYSO soccer coach? Why not use your accent to bang half the town while trying to chase after your ex-wife before she gets married to some guy named Matt (James Tupper)?

Speaking of housewives, we have one housewife who is lonely (Judy Greer), a housewife who used to be a sports caster (Catherine Zeta-Jones), a housewife who is being cheated on and rich (Uma Thurman), said rich husband who tries to buy his friendship (Dennis Quaid), and the principal from Glee as the owner of his property (Iqbal Theba)!

Basically everyone in this suburban neighborhood is rich and powerful, yet somehow couldn’t get a decent soccer coach til George. Very strange.

He may have banged everyone in this photo. Maybe. Just saying.

Ugh. Ughhh. I feel like every stereotypical thing that may have happened in a RomCom, happened in this movie, and then some more. Ready for some SPOILERS? Well, surprisingly enough, the two do get back together by the end.

By the end, he also will realize his family is more important than his career, although the job he gets in Virginia can’t ever be as well off as his job at ESPN. Changing his life for the better monetarily will have to wait a bit.

He also is still able to let down his kid, mess up his coaching duties, and let everything blow up before he almost convinces his wife to leave her new fiance. Matt. Matt is a useless character. He is in a lot of scenes, but he barely has any lines, has no personality, and is just a waste of space. They really didn’t want you to pay attention to him at all.

Dennis Quaid’s character looked like he would have a heart attack, the entire movie. An interesting direction to take a character, but it was only annoying.

I am also not sure of the audience for this movie. It is rated PG-13, despite looking a lot like a family movie. Why the high rating? Because of Uma Thurman clad in lingerie in his bed, and the other sex scenes involving Judy Greer and Catherine Zeta-Jones. Nothing too graphic, but they do exist.

Playing For Keeps is a formulaic movie that also tries to include things that would appeal to many different groups, which in turn just makes it work for no one.

I instantly wanted to see Friends With Kids as soon as I saw the first trailer. Wait no, that’s not right. I wanted to see it as soon as I saw the cast list.

I was so excited to see all these people I liked in it, and then you know, one person I didn’t know. I also noticed that they didn’t really try to advertise this movie at all, outside the week before it came out. That sucks. Oh well, I am sure it isn’t entire cliche based.

Hey! I know these people. And none of them are the main people.

Alright, so we got a group of friends, two couples, and two single people. Adam Scott is a successful business man doing something, and Jennifer Westfeldt is also successful at something. They are just friends though. The couple friends at Maya Rudolph and Chris O’Dowd, who are about to have a kid, and Kristen Wiig and Jon Hamm who also are going to have a kid. Well that is weird.

Four years later, their friends are completely different, and also potentially having marital woes. But when you are married you cant just ask for a “break” without it being a big deal. With Jennifer’s biological clock going off and never finding a good guy, Adam thinks they should have a child together! BUt you know, no relationship, just have a baby, raise him separately and maintain their distance and friendship, and thus, no problems! Couldn’t go wrong.

A few years later, they even are seeing people. Well first Adam finds a girl walking a dog in the park, Megan Fox, despite her being way younger than him. This makes Jennifer upset (for some reason?) but she finds an older more experienced guy, Edward Burns, who has interesting stories and knows how to treat a woman and get shit done. As the kid gets older, I don’t expect him to find it weird about his parents situation. Sure their friends do, but come on, this is 2012. Babies probably have their shit together sooner now.

I was told it was good to acknowledge the main cast in the pictures too. Fineee.

You are probably wondering, “No really who the hell is that main actress? I know everyone else in the movie but her!?”. Well she is the writer and director damn it, and clearly the only woman she knows who can articulate the emotions she wants so she did it her self! That explains it. This is also supposed to be a bit more realistic than your standard RomComs, and I can say that it is. Parents having natural fights and getting through it, and some that don’t. Friends who are honest with each other, and some that drink too much.

But the dialogue between Adam and Jennifer is great and yet not the best part of the movie. Jon Hamm, as he tends to do, steals the show, and you find yourself paying attention to him more so whenever he is on screen, that sly dog.

Despite all this, and a decent plot, it just felt like it was both missing something and too long. The ending comes pretty abruptly, but I like that. Just the build up to it? I don’t like it. It takes a long time to get there (I guess that is a realistic approach?) and there is lots of filler that drags the film way down. More than one montage based scene as well. But it does do a nice job at getting to the point early on at least.

Ehh, its hard to describe. Should have been better than what was on screen.

Leap Year has been a very popular topic this year, 2012. A lot more popular than it was the last three years at least.

I like that a lot of different pop culture things seem to be trying to say Leap Day more now, to refer to it like an actual holiday, instead of making the rest of the year participate.

I personally hated the synopsis of the movie when I first heard about it, and kept putting it off. But I have been on an Amy Adams spree lately so might as well watch it now.

I heard there might be a three way involved.

Amy Adams has been dating Adam Scott for awhile. Her job is to make apartments/houses look good enough for people to want to buy them. Even using such clever tricks as baked cookie smell. Because that is very original.

She thinks the boyfriend is about to propose, but nope, just some nice earrings. Oh well. He is going to Dublin for a business meeting, while they are waiting to find out if they are getting a condo or not. Because of the ravings of her father (John Lithgow), she is reminded of the Irish tradition that “allows” women to propose to men on the 29th of Feburary. And he is going to be in Ireland on Leap Day! Yes! Perfect timing! She is going to take it on her own and fix it, because she is a woman and woman can do their own things. So first, a flight to Dublin!

But weather sucks in the UK. Bad weather. She got /most/ of the way there. Wales. Pretty much made it I think. But whatever. Also she cannot get a boat to Dublin. She has to stay in the village (and somehow finds herself the only traveler there) and hopefully get a taxi to Dublin (is that doable..?).

Seriously. Geographically speaking, is there a way to drive from Wales to Dublin, Ireland? I don’t think so. Because in her travel to Dublin, there is never a time being on a ship. The train she tries to get on she misses, so the main means of travel are hitching, cars, and a bus. So uhh. What the fuck?

Seriously. Why not go on a road trip from Texas to Australia?

So in the village she meets Matthew Goode, who eventually agrees to take her along the way. Problems occur, transportation changes, and the trip keeps taking a lot longer to do. Somehow she realizes she doesn’t like Adam Scott. Who proposes to her when she gets to Dublin (fuck your leap day role reversals!). Why does he do it? Apparently helps them get their condo.

But when a fire alarm happens, she is mad that he grabs a bunch of electronics and leaves him and goes back to the guy she has known for 2 days and made out with some (cheating on her long term boyfriend).

But besides all that shenanigans, and random role changes. WHAT THE FUCK HOW DID SHE GET TO DUBLIN. Seriously did you see that map??

They never got on a damn boat or train. I just checked. No bridge between the two islands. I really have no idea. She also constantly says she doesn’t believe in all the travel superstitions and stuff that characters keep bringing it up, despite basing her whole journey off of one.

I also hate the concept, just like I did before I saw it. ESPECIALLY since the whole point of her doing it was because he was never proposing. But then what happened? He did it. Partially for condo reasons but he obviously loves her enough to be with her that long time.

So then she leaves him after getting everything she wanted. Whatta bitch.

A potentially mermaid bitch.

Again, a movie with a thousand tags. But I will explain it very simply for you so that is all makes sense. The plot of Away We Go it turns out is pretty damn simple to understand. More time for analysis (if I choose). Hooray!

It’s about love. And finding your love’s vagina.

John Krasinski and Maya Rudolph are an unmarried couple, but guess what, they are having a baby. She doesn’t want to get married, but still truly believes they will be together forever. They had moved to be closer to John’s parents (Jeff Daniels and Catherine O’Hara) to have some sort of relative in the babies life, since her parents are dead.

But when she is 6 months in, they find out they are moving to Belgium. For two years. Making their living arrangements kind of pointless. Afraid that their lives are fucked up and bad, they agree to go on a mini vacation to different parts of the country to visit their other family memmbers and friends, to see if they would be good places to live.

First to Arizona, to see Maya’s old boss and her husband / family (Allison Janney and Jim Gaffigan) who seem to be drunk a lot, and not too happy with life, and her sister. Then to Madison, for a job interview, where they also meet John’s cousin and husband (Maggie Gyllenhaal and Josh Hamilton), who are way too extreme on the hippy side.

Then to Montreal, to visit their mutual friends (Melanie Lynskey and Chris Messina), who have adopted many children, due to the unfortunate nature of Melanie’s ability to have a child (multiple miscarriages). Finally, a trip to Miami, to visit John’s brother (Paul Schneider) and help him out of a bad situation.

The whole time they are traveling they are dealing with their own problems, and wondering about their own inadequacies. And by both of them, I mean Maya. Because John is way too swell of a person, and optimistic, he is constantly making things better, all while looking like a hipster.

Exhibit A.

Their final destination choice I will let remain a mystery. Because fuck you, that’s why.

I thought the movie was pretty enjoyable. I laughed a lot more than I expected, thinking it would be a lot more heavily drama-nated. But man, there was many great scenes, and it all felt incredibly real. Hopefully their love in this fictional universe of the movie carries on after the birth and throughout their whole life. You are given a nice feeling that they have found true peace and happiness with their decisions, and everything will work out for the best.

Also, a lot of vagina talk.

I bought Post Grad on Blu-Ray and immediately felt guilty. There was no way this movie was going to be one of the better movies out there. No way at all.

Not saying it would have been bad. But I was going to expect a lot of cliches and stereotypes. Also Alexis Bledel‘s eyes were staring at me, and kind of just made me buy it.

So…Blue….

Alexis Bledel has graduated college! She is a savvy technological young person, with the world open to her. Although she didn’t get valedictorian (Because her college has a valedictorian? ) she wants to work at a publishing house and find the next great american novel. Small dreams I guess. But hey, she is a college graduate, so it should be easy?

Nah. Because who cares about Bachelor’s degrees? Masters is where that shit is out, and she just doesn’t know it yet. What she also doesn’t realize is her best guy friend clearly wants her, Zach Gilford (Hey, he was in The River Why).

She is also living with her family, her dad (Michael Keaton), mom (Jane Lynch), and grandmother (Carol Burnett), so needless to say she has a very successful family. Or her dad is a con artist maybe? Suitcase salesman kind of?

She also has a “hot neighbor” played by Rodrigo Santoro, who you may remember (hate?) as that guy Paulo from Lost.

I don’t think I’ve mentioned the plot yet though. So she wants a job. Can’t get one she wants. Keeps going through other jobs. Keeps ignoring her clearly “true love” best friend. Finally gets dream job. Gives up dream job to move to her true love, realizing that a man is more important than the career she has dreamed of her whole life.

What? Oh yeah, spoilers. Seriously. That is how it ended. Also she has competition with that valedictorian (Catherine Reitman) who plays a way too fake individual, that doesn’t make any sense.

PLUS he is a musician. Come on girl. Give up your dreams.

I don’t even know how to end this. Clearly I am mad at the ending. It is super cliched, and horrible. It was her life dream, and she was like, “lolololjk”. Having a man going to law school way more important than your overall goals.

The fake characters bugged me, and the plot was stupid. That is all.

The Ugly Truth About Cats and [Slum]Dog Million Dollar Baby Geniuses.

Sorry, I just meant to write the review title, but it just kept flowing.

What do those movies even have in common? Practically nothing. What a nonsensical intro!

Oh! Like how every RomCom is nonsensical in that these attractive women apparently have such crazy personalities or demands that they can’t find “love” and their life is so hard. Yes! Nailed it!

Katherine Heigl plays that woman! She is consumed by her career, helping run a New program. So much work. Also, holy shit, is she in anything that is not a RomCom?

Well late one night she accidentally finds herself watching a show on a lesser network called The Ugly Truth. This is where Gerard Butler tells people why their idea of love and relationships are wrong, about how simple guys are, and whatever. Even takes in calls, and will argue with them. Heigl thinks he is wrong. So she hates him. Oh surprise, their news isn’t doing so hot so the head guy hires him to do a small segment every week. Well shit.

And he is popular and he helps the show. Thankfully the man of her dreams (Eric Winter) also moves in next door to her, and he is a doctor. But how will she get him to notice her? Oh of course, Butler will coach her through it. Blah blah, turns out he isn’t the one for her, and Butler is! Happily ever after!

They almost made a hockey reference in this scene!

So yeah, another obvious RomCom, another obvious plot. So really the only thing that can save this movie is how funny it is. Thankfully they made Gerard Butler’s “honest” character hilarious, and he will provide a bunch of blunt laughter. If you are a fan of When Harry Met Sally-esque dinner scenes, there is also a pretty big moment on that scale.

At the end of the day, this movie doesn’t add much to the R Rated RomComs. It has some laughs, but other movies definitely do it better still.

I was reluctant to watch Midnight in Paris because it had some things I am generally afraid of. One being Owen Wilson acting, the other being the possibility that I might not get it, because it is a Woody Allen movie. I think there is an unspoken rule that if you don’t like Woody Allen, you are bad at movies. Or something like that. So I have been putting his recent movies off. Even that one with Scarlet Johansson!

But now that I have seen a recent one, I am coming for you Vicky Christina Barcelona!

Film begins with Owen and Rachel McAdams, in Paris! They are married. He is a writer. But they have issues. Hopefully Paris with her parents and friends can help them. The dad is played by Kurt Fuller, who always makes me laugh. Not by what he does, just because of his looks and Wayne’s World.

Well, one night when he just wants to walk around and not go out dancing, he gets invited into an old timey car right at midnight. Reluctantly, he goes with them out to a bar, and eventually realizes he is in the 1920s Paris, much like what his novel is about. He meets the F. Scott Fitzgerald! And other people. Like Corey Stoll as Ernest Hemingway, and Kathy Bates as Gertrude Stein. Famous artists throughout the earl 1900s who inhabited Paris show up, from writers, to song writers, to painters, and more. Night after night he goes to the same place to be picked up by the car, alone after he realizes his wife wouldn’t understand.

Yeah. And he meets a girl. “Adriana” or Marion Cotillard. Not sure if she is actually someone famous or not. But he likes her way more. Afterall, she lives in the “Golden Ages!”

Allegedly.

Despite it being a “RomCom” it definitely takes it in a weirder direction. My whole time watching, despite it being obvious that they weren’t good together, I was thinking that if these trips through time were real, just being with Adriana in them was him cheating. Bugged me.

I thought the dialogue was really good though. Made me interested in what was going on, and during a time I usually don’t care about. The overall theme of grass being greener was a good one to follow, but maybe a bit too forced at the end.

So yeah. Decent.