Category Archives: Comedy

Challengers

Challengers        3 ½ stars

Challengers by Luca Guadagnino takes us into the world of professional tennis and combines it with probably one of steamiest love triangles ever in the movies. The sweat dripping off the bodies of the two male leads, Mike Faist and Josh O’Connor makes you feel the heat coming off the screen. The energy of these two expended while engaged in their matches aided by the quick camera shots from the point of view of the ball is equaled by their hot scenes with co-star Zendaya with one or the other or both at the same time in the make-out scenes. In one scene at an outdoor party, Nelly’s It’s Getting Hot in Here is playing practically making it a theme song for the movie. The actual story of these three characters is almost unimportant, but it is about two tennis stars, Art (Mike Faist) and Patrick (Josh O’Connor) who are friends as teenagers and make the acquaintance of female tennis star, Tashi Duncan (Zendaya) at a college tournament. The movie follows these three over a period of several years as one or the other has gained Tashi’s affection. Tashi assumes various roles through the story: lover, wife, coach and homewrecker, told through a fractured timeline with multiple flash backs. The movie centers on a single match between the two male tennis stars that lasts through the entire span of the movie with extended scenes telling the history of their complicated relationship. A major part of the story is about Art’s stardom as a tennis player, but he is in a slump wondering if he can make a star appearance at the next US Open. Tashi, his wife, has a plan to get Art’s confidence by him playing against former friend Patrick in a match at a local tournament. But the story is secondary, of course to the steaminess of the character’s scenes together. I noticed that the movie lacks any real supporting cast. Normally, there would be supporting characters that the leads confide in or have some relationship with. Here, any other characters are just there for background, including Tashi’s immediate family. The three main characters seem only to interact with each other. I cannot finish this review without mentioning the brilliant score by Atticus Ross and Trent Reznor. It is a fast-moving thumping dance score combined with disco that amps up the action taking place on the court. The score should receive some attention when the Oscar nominations come. Less so with the other categories though.  Look for Luca Guadagnino’s next film, Queer, to be released early next year.

Encanto

Encanto                4 stars

The newest animated Disney movie, Encanto takes us to the mountains in Columbia where an extended family all live in a magical house in an isolated village. The main character is Mirabel, a young woman who sings around town and generally brightens everyone’s day. In this family every member is granted a special magic gift as they grow up. Mirabel’s sisters and cousins all found their gifts but when it was Mirabel’s turn she was told by the house that she had none, a burden that is hard to accept. She then takes on the mission to find out the family secret involving a hidden vision, a lost uncle and impending signs of doom in the small town. With plenty of whimsical songs, colorful scenes and amusing characters, the movie provides the expected Disney magic that is well suited to children. Some of the original songs were composed by Lin-Manuel Miranda, but they may not be as memorable as his best works. The film brings an encouraging message that our families are not perfect, but we can be willing to accept them for who they are and celebrate what they bring to our lives.

Don’t Look Up

Don’t Look Up   2 ½ stars

I was among the first to view Adam McKay’s new satirical comedy Don’t Look Up, just released in theaters. McKay has previously brought us The Big Short and Vice, both inventive and amusing films. In Don’t Look Up we have a star-studded cast in a movie about the approaching end of the world. Leonardo DiCaprio is Michigan State astronomer Dr. Randall Mindy and Jennifer Lawrence (who we haven’t seen much of lately outside of The X-Men franchise) is grad student Kate Dibiasky who have just discovered a new comet in the solar system. Unfortunately for them and the rest of humanity the calculations show that the five to ten kilometer wide comet will crash into earth in just six months and will cause a cataclysmic event and destroy all human life. The Don’t Look Up title refers to the faction of disbelievers who deny the facts before them including the visible comet in the sky. The parallels to the environmental crisis and the denials we see are obvious. Most people are more interested in following social media and watching what is going on with their favorite pop stars than the stories of impending doom. (Good for Ariana Grande mocking herself.) Even President Janie Orlean (Meryl Streep) and her dimwitted son Jason, serving as White House Chief of Staff (Jonah Hill) cannot be bothered with listening to science and just want to move on. (The elections are coming soon.) A lot of the humor is a spot on indictment our media obsessed culture in America, but overall the movie goes overboard on the ridiculous plot, including a tech mogul (Mark Rylance) who is more interested in profiting from the situation than saving the planet. The movie, at two and a quarter hours could have been much shorter and did not have to rely on so much CGI effects to make its point. I read that many of the stars jumped at the chance to be in this satire, but after a while I thought the point had been made. The rest was unnecessary flush and craziness.

Love and Monsters

Love and Monsters         4 ½ stars

It’s almost Christmas so what better time to see a movie about the end of the world? In the action comedy Love and Monsters we follow the exploits of Joel, a young twenty something man on a journey to be reunited with his high school sweetheart. The only thing is that most of the human population has been wiped out by giant mutant creatures that have infested the planet after multiple rockets were fired into space to destroy a comet that was on a collision course with earth. But the pollution from the rockets resulted in said mutant creatures. Does this sound completely implausible? Yes, but don’t worry about it. Joel leaves his underground colony of fellow citizens on an 85 mile journey across hostile terrain to find his love, Aimee, who he has not seen in seven years. Along the way he is accompanied by a dog named Boy who aids him as he battles some giant carnivorous creatures. So far this sounds like a very tame variation on A Boy and His Dog. (If you haven’t seen the movie from the seventies you should check it out.) This movie, though is very family friendly due to the personality of the star, Dylan O’Brien as Joel. Like any family oriented movie it has a positive message like learning to gain self confidence and to appreciate those we love. It deserves some special recognition for some impressive effects that bring the monsters to life. I didn’t know what to expect when I started the movie, but found it enjoyable. It seemed odd though that there was a near lack of firearms with the humans relying mostly on crossbows, spears and swords for defense. Along with an occasional hand grenade.

Your Monster

Your Monster    3 stars

Once again, I had the chance to see a film in the theaters that I missed this year at Sundance. Your Monster by first time director Caroline Lindy is a sort of rom-com horror movie for women coming out of a bad relationship. In the movie Laura (Melissa Barrera of 2021’s In the Heights) is an actor and musical theater geek who has been dating Jacob (Edmund Donovan), a theater director for five years and has been helping him with developing his musical production. That is, until Laura is diagnosed with cancer and the douchebag, Jacob decides to leave her. (It is reported that Lindy came up with the story based on her own experience with a douchebag; hence the movie trailer claim: “based on a true-ish story”). With the help of her only friend, Masie (Kayla Foster), Laura moves into her mother’s house and becomes an emotional wreck (an understatement to be sure). It is there that she discovers that there is a rather fearsome looking monster living in her bedroom closet and that he has been there since Laura was a child. The monster is played by Tommy Dewey who is also the executive producer of the movie. At first, Laura is scared to death of this creature, and he wants her out of the house. But since she has no place to go, they tolerate each other and try to work out a living arrangement. As the two become more familiar, the monster, who sports a beard and has a catlike appearance, encourages her to audition for a part in Jacob’s musical and she gives it a try, landing an understudy role for the part that was originally intended for her. Then as things progress, she finds that this monster also has an interest in literature and theater, so the two become a little too close. Eventually, the monster becomes like an inner voice to Laura, making her realize how she has been wronged by Jacob and should find a way to express her feelings. Naturally, things go a little too far with some brutal and bloody consequences, a requirement of most horror movies even if it is a romcom. Most of the movie though has a light feel to it thanks to the numerous musical numbers that could come out of a forties or fifties musical comedy. I thought it was an interesting take on the comedy horror genre, but I found the monster to be a little too perfect for Laura to really buy it. (If he spends all his time in the closet and under the bed, why should he know so much about the outside world after all.) For a better performance by Tommy Dewey, you should see the movie Saturday Night where he plays the head writer of Saturday Night, Michael O’Donoghue. For a more entertaining comedy horror movie I recommend Ginger Snaps which I reviewed last year.

Something In The Dirt

Something In the Dirt                                                     2 suns

In this story about paranormal activity, Levi has just moved to a new apartment in the Hollywood Hills where he strikes up an acquaintance with long time resident John. Then the two witness the impossible in Levi’s apartment as objects seem to float in the air and light emanates into the room with no source. The dives into endless tangents involving numerology, the Pythagorean Brotherhood, alien fruit, a perfect ratio and long dead city planners as this weird pair of random dudes try to solve the mysteries of the universe. They come up with the idea of making a documentary about the experiences, but their own incompetence gets in the way. Flash forward scenes with interviews of others linked to the documentary lead us to believe that the plan went awry at some point. This low budget movie was made mainly by three close friends in the apartment owned by one of them. It’s a fairly long movie that just is forever following the rabbit hole. It is silly and in the Q&A we learn that at one point the movie was three and a half hours long. We also learn that Something in the Dirt is the fifth movie created by this group of friends. I will not be seeking out their earlier works.

Saturday Night

Saturday Night  4 stars

Chevy Chase at the Weekend Update news desk. John Belushi in a bee costume. A profusely bleeding Julia Child. The infamous Land Shark. These are all very familiar images to the fans of Saturday Night Live in its first incarnation back in 1975. Saturday Night, directed and co-written by Jason Reitman (Whiplash, Juno) takes us back to the night in October, 1975, when in 90 minutes the first episode of a revolutionary new comedy show called Saturday Night is set to go live on NBC. The show went on to become a staple of late night television, but those who were there that night had no way of knowing that. Calling the scenes chaotic would be an understatement. In 90 minutes, we see fights breaking out between actors, a fire burning on stage, the sound system failing, one cast member refusing to sign his contract because of a bee costume, a few confrontations with the network censor who can’t quite grasp some of the script’s sexual references and a studio executive threatening to air a Johnny Carson rerun in place of the show. According to what I have read, much of what we are seeing is based on recollections from those who were there on October 11, 1975. It’s hard to imagine that the show was not better planned and had so many loose ends before airing, but this is what we are to believe. Much of the credit for the success of the movie must go to lead actor Gabriel Labelle, (of The Fabelmans) who portrays producer Lorne Michaels trying to keep his cool and deal with a myriad of mishaps. There are a few familiar faces in the cast that include J. K. Simmons as an arrogant Milton Berle, Willem Dafoe as NBC studio executive David Tebet, Matthew Rhys as the show’s host, George Carlin and Nicolas Braun as both a whiny Jim Henson and nervous comedian Andy Kaufman. Jon Batiste appears briefly as musical guest Billy Preston. The casting of the Not Ready for Primetime Players was spot on. The young cast is made up of practically all unknown actors that I did not recognize, but I had no difficulty picking out who it was they were portraying. The look of the comic actors was near perfect from the style of Chevy Chase, the moodiness of John Belushi to the wackiness of Gilda Radnor. The only cast actors that I did recognize were Lamorne Morris (New Girl) as Garrett Morris and Rachel Sennott (Bottoms) as Lorne Michael’s wife and show writer Rosie Shuster. (Rosie plays an important role in convincing John Belushi not to walk out on the show before it even starts.) We gain some insights about the show along the way including that some studio execs wanted the show to fail and were only using it as leverage against Johnny Carson. And we see how Chevy Chase and John Belushi hated each other. (And how head writer, Michael O’Donoghue hated everybody.) We even catch a glimpse of writing team Al Franken and Tom Davis. Those of you who were around for the beginning of Saturday Night Live should definitely see it to see what happened before Chevy Chase said “Live from New York, It’s Saturday Night!” for the first time. Afterward I went back and watched the first episode again. I must say the magic was still there.

Emergency

Emergency         3 ½ suns

In the comedy Emergency, graduate student Kunle and his best friend, Sean are about to go on an epic journey, partying all night at the fraternity parties at their college campus. But the plans of the two young black men are interrupted when they discover an unconscious white girl on the floor of their house. The pair along with their Latino friend, Carlos realize the danger they are in if the police are alerted to their situation and must improvise to get the girl to safety without endangering their own lives. What follows is a comedy of errors as the men deal with one mishap after another. The film started as a short film from a few years ago that has now been expanded to the full length movie now showing. It is a good combination of silly comedy making a statement about the perceptions that young black men must face despite the levels of success they may reach.

Leonor Will Never Die

Leonor Will Never Die    3 ½ suns

Leonor Will Never Die received the World Cinema Dramatic Innovative Spirit Special Jury Award. The movie fits in well with the name of the award as the premise was especially creative. Set in the Philippines, elderly Leonor Reyes was once a major screenwriter for Filipino action movies. But now she mainly stays at home and can’t pay all her bills to the frustration of her son. One day she takes renewed interest in one of her old movie scripts after reading that the studios are looking for new scripts, but then she ends up in the hospital in a coma after being struck in the head by a falling television. It is then that the film takes us into uncharted territory as Leonor goes about creating an action movie in her mind concerning an action hero names Ronwaldo. She appears in her own movie, manipulating events to her own liking, occasionally reworking scenes that didn’t work out right. The imagined movie then sometimes blends with real life to somewhat resemble ideas out of The Matrix. The film is something of an homage to seventies action movies from the Philippines which was quite an industry in those times. It is especially violent and heavy on heroic scenes for its action stars. I certainly did not know what to expect with this one.

Drive-Away Dolls

Drive-Away Dolls              3 stars

If you are going to see a Coen brothers movie you know you are going to get some violent scenes often with inept crooks, some dark humor and some rather odd characters. Just think of The Big Lebowski, Burn After Reading or Fargo. With this year’s Drive-Away Dolls we only have Ethan Coen directing, joined by Tricia Cooke’s writing, but we do get most of the usual elements. What we also get is a road buddy movie with a pair of lesbians on a mission to get laid, combined with plenty of dick gags. We start out in 1999 with a “Collector” (Pedro Pascal from The Last of Us and The Mandalorian) receiving a package in a briefcase but is quickly robbed and murdered by a pair of goons (Joey Slotnick and C. J. Wilson). We cut to our two heroes, Jamie (Margaret Qualley of The Nice Guys and Once Upon a Time…In Hollywood) and Marian (Geraldine Viswanathan of Bad Education and Cat Person), who are both lesbians and best friends. Jamie is the adventurous one always looking for her next sexual exploit and Marian is the high strung, but intellectual one. They have a plan to do a drive away from New England to Tallahassee, Florida. This is a cheap way to travel by driving a car that the car’s owner needs delivered to another city. Hence, the title: Drive-Away Dolls. Only Jamie also plans to find all the lesbian hangouts along the way so that the repressed Marian can get laid. In Coen fashion the plan gets complicated when by accident the girls pick up a car that was intended for the pair of goons identified earlier and happens also to contain two special “packages” in the trunk. The boss of the criminal enterprise, (Colman Domingo) is none too pleased by the turn of events and tasks the goons to track the girls down and retrieve the packages. What follows then are the sexual adventures of the two women that happens to include an interlude with an all-lesbian soccer team, combined with the total ineptitude of our two goons trying to find them. (They get a little help from another lesbian friend of Jamie’s called Sukie (Beanie Feldstein of Booksmart) who also happens to be a cop. But this meeting doesn’t go well for the goons.) I must not neglect to mention that there is one additional character that appears briefly but is very pivotal to the story. And he is played by Matt Damon. (Also, this character’s penis figures prominently into the plot.) So, anyone who is a Matt Damon fan should not miss it. Overall, the movie has its moments, but it seems like a mixture of two films that don’t mesh very well. It’s good for a few laughs.