Tag: Sharon Horgan

Nicolas Cage. Is he a man, or an aberration? Is he a great actor or a bad actor? Many people have struggled with this question for decades, and it is a question that has brought Abed down to his knees in humility.

Regardless of what you think about Cage, you have certainly heard of him. A lot of people have strong opinions about his acting and his choices, especially recently. He has been in some straight to DVD nonsense, but that is also generally known to be due how one of his financial advisors screwed him out of money and he was stuck paying the bill with his wallet missing. But in the last few years, the bad choices have seemed to drift into weird and interesting choices. Wally’s Wonderland, where he plays a literal silent protagonist and speaks not a single word of dialogue. Mandy, and all of the fucked up movie that is. Pig, a surprisingly amazing drama that looks like a John Wick rip-off that does so much more.

And then I heard about The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent. The first description blew me away with what it wanted to do. I knew I had to see it. I went out of my way to watch what I felt were the most essential Cage films I hadn’t yet seen before in my life, leading up to this movie. Just to catch more references and have a better frame of mind for this NickCage-fest. Give me your weird ass films. I need them.

I. Need. Them.

The different people seeing this film. One who knows and likes Cage movies, the other very confused at who Nick Cage is.

What does a magnificent actor need to do when he finds himself under appreciated and maybe even mocked by friends and fans alike? When your debts are piling up, when your family won’t talk to you, and you see a big film break coming up that will revitalize your career as a major player? After all, maybe the big break will you get you bigger roles, and more clout, (not that you went anywhere), and you can go into the tail end of your career flying high.

That is what is going though Nick Cage’s (Nicolas Cage) head. He has bills to pay, debts, and he can’t land the lead of a new film that he thinks will be a box office and critical success. But his agent (Neil Patrick Harris) had another gig for him, although embarrassing. He just needs to go to another country and go to some super fan’s birthday party. Make an appearance, talk to guests, and easy million dollars. Cage feels desperate, so he takes the gig, but he feels like he is going to also have to retire from acting, that he can’t keep up with the charade.

Of course when Cage gets down there, he makes things awkward. Javi Gutierrez (Pedro Pascal) is not just a super-fan, but he also wrote a script and wants Cage to star in a movie. Cage doesn’t know about that, and thinks that Gutierrez is a worker at the mansion. Not to mention that Cage gets intercepted by the CIA (Tiffany Haddish, Ike Barinholtz) because they believe Gutierrez recently kidnapped the mayor’s daughter, in order to threaten him before an upcoming election. Gutierrez is awkward, but is he a bad guy? Now Cage has to stay longer than expected, to check the compound, and become a spy, which is basically just acting anyways. Cage is probably the perfect person for this job. Sometimes it is easier to hide with a beacon on your face.

Also starring Alessandra Mastronardi, Jacob Scipio, Lily Mo Sheen, Paco León, and Sharon Horgan.

But really, I just want to watch Cage watch real movies with his fictional family. 

Surprisingly, The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent is not the zaniest film I have seen this year. Not even the weirdest. It didn’t even make me cry. All of those titles, at this point, would go to Everything Everywhere All At Once.

But this movie is still incredibly fun! I don’t know how to talk about it as someone who doesn’t know much about Cage, so I do apologize in that regard. But if you are familiar with his work and generally receptive to a lot of his films, I can’t imagine now appreciating this fictional version of his life. He pokes fun at his perceptions, while also playing hard into them. It is just so silly, it is infectious. Despite being a film that is a love letter to Cage, it doesn’t completely hog the spotlight, while giving shout outs to other great films in cinema history from The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari to Paddington 2.

Sure, the plot is pretty weak. It is going for meta humor so hard that it doesn’t always land. The CIA plotline, although necessary for the story, feels detracting by taking us away from the funnier moments, which is when Cage and Pascal share the screen.

This is one of those movies for people who love going to the movies. A movie that is mindless fun that doesn’t need you to turn off your brain in order to enjoy it. Cage is living his best life, and we are all just people in the world getting to witness this rebirth of his movie choices (not that he went anywhere), and this is a film about just having to learn to accept it. While not being one of the best movies ever made, it is an enjoyable one, and definitely a film we need in our lives during this time of weary and stress.

In 2011, a short documentary came out of Great Britain. It was called Jaime: Drag Queen at 16. It was about a boy, who by 16, knew he wanted to be a drag queen and went for it, despite living in a conservative place, and not even being an adult yet. He had a mom who helped encouraged him to follow his dreams, and follow his dreams he did, damn it.

And so then they made a British stage musical about it. It has the same name, Everybody’s Talking About Jaime. That one came out in 2017, and I guess it was loved enough, so that only three years later, here we are with a movie version of the stage musical.

A very quick turn around. Great if you love the musical, but also a little bit suspicious. Most musicals put it off as long as they can, because it usually signifies their show is almost over on its long stand, and it will help boost sales or give them an alternative revenue. For a turn around like this, I don’t know what to expect, except I am happy it came out this year. 2021 is the year of musicals, so let’s just pile them on all over me.

Pictured: Me smothered in musicals (each light is one musical this year). 

Jaime (Max Harwood) is turning 16, and is gay, and everyone knows it. Jaime is proud of himself and isn’t trying to hide it, despite the risk of bullies that exists. But what they don’t know about Jaime is that he also dreams of being famous. Not too surprising a dream for a kid, but Jaime wants to be a famous drag queen. He love’s typical women’s fashion, wants to put on a dress, wear a wig, and lip sync to some diva hit on stage.

But he keeps that a secret. His mom (Sarah Lancashire) knows that about him, and encourages him to go for his interests. His dad (Ralph Ineson) knows he is gay, and honestly, doesn’t like that. He is basically out the door and with another woman this whole time, doesn’t care about his son. Jamie’s best friend, Pritti (Lauren Patel), also knows his dreams, while she herself wants to be a doctor.

But screw it. The year is almost over, Jamie is turning 16, he wants to start being an actual drag queen, full outfit, and he wants to come out as a drag queen at the end of the year prom! While shopping, he finds a mentor (Richard E. Grant) to help guide him on his journey, while he battles bullies (Samuel Bottomley), teachers (Sharon Horgan), and more to live life the way he has always wanted.

Also featuring Shobna Gulati.

Face it kid, you’re gonna be a drag star.

I will say the same thing I say in a lot of these movies. Representation matters. There aren’t really many movies coming out, even in our modern world, about becoming a drag queen and why that is a perfectly valid lifestyle choice. Shit. In the 1990’s in a two year span, we somehow got both The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert and To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar.  I can’t think of many other examples outside of them, but I am sure they exist, they just haven’t reached any level of popularity. So it is fantastic that we have a movie on this topic coming out in a popular-ish way. 

Now on this note, I am definitely saying, this movie isn’t really that great. It should be a 1 out of 4 purely on its own, but I gave bonus points for being about a topic not talked about much.

After the musical, none of the songs were stuck in my head. They have a song called Everybody’s Talking About Jaime, which might be there go to hit I guess, and the only reason it stuck with me more is because they played a different cover of it for the credits. 

Acting is average, but it felt like it could have been a made for TV movie on Freeform at the same time. The “villains” of this film started out reasonable and just turned into strange cartoon characters by the end. The math teacher really made no sense (and I am not just saying this as a math teacher myself). Outside of an art teacher once, and the principal once, she is the only teacher ever shown, and it is over and over, and apparently whatever she says is the main authority of the building.

The final scenes in front of the prom were ridiculous. Why is literally their whole class standing outside of the building instead of going in it. How many times does the teacher have to say “Everybody go inside” before it means everybody? I was confused each time she said it and the students argued with her about Jaime getting to go too, because she literally just said everyone, which should include Jaime. but apparently it doesn’t? And again, why is she this literal gatekeeper to the building and no one else? 

The film can have a great message about accepting yourself and others, but it just feels so dumb at the same time. 

For a year full of musicals, this one is not rising to the top, and it is important to point that out. It presumably couldn’t hack it on Broadway either, and that is why we have the movie now. I assume songs were cut from the musical for the movie, but it feels like it had less than ten songs overall still. Give me more musical in my musicals, damn it. 

The first trailer I saw for Game Night, I sort of knew I was hooked.

If anything, I would love to watch a movie about people who like to just play games. Board games and party games. I knew they wouldn’t get into the nitty gritty of great games, but any positive spin on board games is good in my book.

And yeah, sure, comedy and death. The other two things that go great with a nice game night amongst couples and friends.

And puppies. All gamers love puppies.

Max (Jason Bateman) met Annie (Rachel McAdams) on a trivia night at a bar. They were both captains of different teams, kicking ass, and knowing the same questions. It was love at first sight.

Over the years their competitive nature took them many places. Mostly to their living room, hanging out with friends and loved ones, playing games of skill and chance, and eventually getting married! But if there is one game they are not succeeding at, it is the whole pregnancy thing. Max cannot perform on that level.

And the doctors think it could be performance anxiety. It turns out that Max has a more successful older brother (Kyle Chandler). I mean, he looks better, he is richer, he wins all of the games against his brother, and just his life is so fucking awesome. And when the brother shows up, he wants to beat him at hosting duties as well.

He throws his own game night, with alcohol, and a game where people will come and abduct one of the guests! They have to follow the clues to find the kidnapped victim first, and the winning pair will win a goddamn car. Yeah, his game night is way cooler. Unfortunately, the brother was into some hardcore bad stuff. And the kidnappers this night are real, just the rest of the party won’t realize it until things are too deep.

Also starring Chelsea Peretti, Danny Huston, Michael C. Hall, Lamorne Morris, Kylie Bunbury, Jesse Plemens, Sharon Horgan, and Billy Magnussen.

“I throw my hands and guns in the air, like wayooooo!”

Bateman and McAdams play a delightful couple, who really care about each other and generally want each other to succeed. They aren’t perfect and they have disagreements, especially in the family department, but they work through it, they communicate, and they have a good time in the face of adversary.

In many ways, their coupling in this film is one of the best couples I have seen lately, outside of TV. TV usually has a lot more happy couples. Movie couples tend to have divorces. And that is a lot of words on just how great of a couple they are.

The film ended up disappointing me on the levels of shenanigans that were promised by the trailer. Honestly, everyone found out the truth of the situation way too early. If they could have had the characters think it was a game and really realistic for longer periods, there could have have been some much longer and happier jokers. But the jokes were too few and far in between.

Sure the overall movie is still amusing, or even cute. There are intense scenarios, surprise cameos, and twists you might not see coming. But these twists are more done for twist reasons, and don’t really end up making a lot of sense.

Game Night if anything has a lot of heart and can be a good time for those who watch it. It just doesn’t have any sort of repeatability factor and cannot live up to its plot potential.