Category Archives: Comedy

Polite Society

Polite Society. 4 stars 

Polite Society appears in the Sundance Midnight section which usually means there will be horror and pain.  This is where you will find some of the bloodiest movies you can imagine at Sundance.   Not so with this one as it is a comedy with martial arts action and British humor featuring young girls.  It took some imagination to create this story set in a London girls school with a mostly Pakistani cast.  Schoolgirl Ria has been studying martial arts and her dream is to become a stuntwoman.  Her sister Lena has dropped out of art school and Ria is horrified to learn that she is being set up for marriage to a wealthy young Pakistani doctor and then moved to Singapore for a nefarious reason.  So Ria makes it her mission to stop this marriage enlisting the help of some of her classmates.  This fast moving comedy uses many of the same techniques seen in modern Asian action movies only with high school age girls.  It’s an interesting blend of genres that we seldom see.  It is directed by Nida Manzoor and stars Priya Kansara of Bridgerton as Ria. The cast and crew were present for the Q&A following the world premiere. 

Marcel the Shell with Shoes On

Marcel the Shell with Shoes On                  4 stars

The stop motion animated feature Marcel the Shell with Shoes On can be described as poignant, heartfelt and fun. This charming “documentary” follows the life of Marcel, a one-inch-tall mollusk shell who has a face with one eye and a pair of sneakers. Marcel lives in a house that is now an Airbnb with his grandmother, Connie, who is also a shell. The latest resident in the house is a man named Dean who is renting the place until he can find a new home. But Dean happens to be an amateur filmmaker and he decides to film Marcel as he goes about his business of living, finding ingenious ways to get around such as using a hollowed-out tennis ball and a bottle of honey. Marcel is quite talented, coming up with makeshift inventions and putting on a show when the time calls for it. He can make telephone calls and has a piece of lint for a pet. But he can also make plenty of mistakes and is very conscious of his shortcomings, making frequent apologies. Marcel is the creation of Jenny Slate, who was on Saturday Night Live for one season and Dean Fleischer-Camp, film director and her then husband. They made short videos of Marcel and placed them on YouTube back around 2010, creating a viral sensation. They then got the idea of making a full movie about the little guy and wrote a story for him. Jenny does the voice and Dean does the filming. Reportedly, they spent seven years making the one-and-a-half-hour movie, released in theaters in 2022. The story is expanded as we learn the house was previously occupied by a couple who fought and split up, but the man took all the other shells that are Marcel’s family with him leaving Marcel and Grandma all alone. So, Dean suggests to Marcel that he can post the videos they make and get the word out about the search for Marcel’s “relatives”. The film has a good message about the value of family and community. It was definitely more entertaining than I initially thought it was going to be. It was nominated for a Best Animated Feature Academy Award.

Babylon

Babylon                2 ½ stars

One word can summarize the Damien Chazelle tribute to old Hollywood known as Babylon. That is extravagance. In the opening scene there is a lavish party for the rich and famous taking place in the mansion of a Hollywood producer complete with drunkenness, cocaine use, nude dancing and a live band. The scene seems to go on forever, only ending with a live elephant being led through the ballroom in order to distract the partiers from the possible overdose death of a drugged out teenager. The movie is full of over-the-top situations and scenes full of extras that are designed to give us a sense of utter chaos. This is how Chazelle sees the world of Hollywood filmmaking in the twenties and thirties (which may not be far from the truth). Other scenes take us to the California desert where elaborate sets are created involving hundreds of people for simultaneous filming of movies. In the silent film era you don’t have to worry about the noise interfering with your scene. Throughout the movie we follow the exploits of three main characters, Manny Torres (Diego Calva), a young Mexican American man starting at the bottom of his career in Hollywood, Nellie LaRoy (Margot Robbie) an unknown actress who is ambitious and certain that she is to become a star and Jack Conrad (Brad Pitt), an aging Hollywood actor who doesn’t realize yet that his career is rapidly coming to an end. Their stories as well as those of a handful of other characters show us how people achieve fame in the film industry only to see their lives ruined or suffer humiliation after the public becomes tired of them. It is a theme as old as Hollywood itself, only Chazelle is determined to assault our senses with all the debauchery, treachery and extreme cruelty that he can pack into Babylon’s three hour runtime. It feels like he is trying to give it a Baz Luhrmann treatment only without the caring for the human qualities of the characters. This is from the same man who brought us La La Land, First Man and Whiplash, all more interesting and entertaining films than Babylon. There is a fascinating scene about the making of the original Singin’ in the Rain (not the Gene Kelly version) and a final homage to Hollywood where we see some of the most famous images from popular films including 2001:A Space Odyssey and Avatar. Margot Robbie I must say gives an amazing performance of the confident Nellie LaRoy and should not be blamed for this overproduced and overhyped movie.

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery           4 stars

Rian Johnson brings us the return of Benoit Blanc, the world’s greatest detective in Glass Onion. The sequel to Johnson’s 2019 hit Knives Out finds Blanc (Daniel Craig) at the scene of a gathering of wealthy friends at a private Greek island owned by entrepreneur Miles Bron (Edward Norton) that includes a giant glass enclosure that Miles calls the Glass Onion. This time the friends are there for a game of whodunit prepared for them as an amusement for one weekend. There we find Bron with his old pals that include Claire (Kathryn Hahn), the governor of Connecticut, Lionel (Leslie Odom, Jr.), an engineer at Bron’s company, Alpha, Birdie (Kate Hudson), a model and “social influencer” who can’t avoid making accidental racial slurs, Duke (Dave Bautista) a YouTube channel host who promotes conspiracy theories among other popular subjects on social media and Andi (Janelle Monae), Bron’s old business partner who dropped out of the business after Miles screwed her over. All were brought here by solving an elaborate box filled with puzzles that revealed the invitation. That is; except for Blanc, who seems to have shown up for mysterious reasons. Bron refers to this group as The Disruptors, but I prefer Blanc’s name for them: the shitheads. Since this is a classic murder mystery we eventually get to a point where bodies start dropping and everybody present seems to have a motive for wanting someone dead. At this point I have to be very careful about not revealing too much of the plot. The situation is well written following the rules for a murder mystery. All of the characters are suspects and we gradually find out more about them and events that happened in the past like as Blanc says, the layers of the onion are peeled back until we reach the center. Each of the actors brings out notable aspects of their character like Norton’s Miles who only cares about himself and Monae’s Andi who has a mysterious air about her. I think I preferred the original Knives Out slightly more, but this one will certainly keep your interest and keep you guessing until the startling conclusion.

Cocaine Bear

Cocaine Bear      3 ½ stars

The title of the hit horror “Cocaine Bear” tells just about everything you can imagine about this movie. “Inspired by true events”, in 1985 the body of a drug dealer with a failed parachute Is discovered in Tennessee, accompanied by a duffle bag of cocaine. Somewhere in a forest in Georgia the rest of the plane load of cocaine was dumped leading to a trio of the dead man’s drug dealer colleagues going in search of the missing drugs. Unfortunately, for them and the rest of the characters in this comical and bloody situation, a 500 pound bear has discovered the drugs first, getting stoned out of its mind after eating at least one brick of cocaine. What follows for the next hour and a half are some of the most hilarious encounters between said bear and the humans unlucky enough to cross paths with the ravenous animal. Besides the drug dealers (including the late Ray Liotta) there are the two teenage kids, Dee Dee and Henry, Dee Dee’s mom (Keri Russell), the local park ranger (Margo Martindale) who has gotten a raw deal on recent mishaps in the park, her activist friend, Peter (Jesse Tyler Ferguson), a trio of teenage boys who get their kicks out of attacking park visitors and a local cop (Isiah Whitlock, Jr.) who aims to get to the bottom of the bizarre happenings in his jurisdiction. All find their way to the woods where the insane bear is hunting its prey. Although it is a comedy, Cocaine Bear deserves its R rating since there is no shortage of blood and gore as one person after another meets their fate at the claws and teeth of the angry bear that includes some missing limbs and at least one disembowelment. There also may be some valuable lessons to be learned when confronted by a bear in the woods, though I wouldn’t be real sure about that. The movie is directed by longtime actor and occasional director Elizabeth Banks known mainly as Effie Trinket in The Hunger Games movie series and is much in the tradition of recent horror comedy movies Werewolves Within and Shadow in the Clouds.

Marry Me

Marry Me            2 ½ stars

I have seen a large number of romantic comedies including some that are really thin on plot. Marry Me starring pop icon Jennifer Lopez and talented funny guy Owen Wilson has to count among the lightest of them. From director Kat Coiro, we get the Cinderella story of recording superstar Kat Valdez (Lopez) who is scheduled to get married to equally super popstar Bastain (Colombian superstar Maluma) during a live concert. This is done to promote her hit song, Marry Me. But moments before the planned ceremony word of Bastian’s infidelity spreads leaving Kat at the altar. What can she do but shout to a single dad in the audience and say she will marry him, (literally some guy)? The guy happens to be Charlie (Wilson) who is a middle school math teacher who is there to accompany his tween daughter, Lou to the concert, along with a work friend (Sarah Silverman). Charlie actually goes ahead with the ceremony in front of everyone, but later has doubts about what he has done. But who wouldn’t want to marry a famous popstar? Kat’s production team is all over the plan as it is great for publicity. The rest of the movie is entirely predictable as the unlikely couple go from reluctance, to being friends, to involved only to run into the inevitable crisis that will bring about the moment of truth. It is good to see these two, who are among the most likable stars in the industry today, but they both deserve more interesting material than Marry Me. Both of them have done better in romantic comedies in the past. I do look forward to seeing Owen Wilson in his upcoming movie, “Paint” later this year.

The Mitchells vs. the Machines

The Mitchells vs. the Machines  4 ½ stars

I caught up with the Netflix 2021 animated feature The Mitchells vs. the Machines which tells how a typical dysfunctional American family dealt with the great robot apocalypse of 2020. This amusing action-filled movie connects well with young and old audiences with its references to how people are dependent, even obsessed with their wireless devices and what happens when those connections go away. 18 year old Katie (Abbi Jacobson) is about to leave home to start film school in California. She has been fascinated about making her own movies and posting them on the internet, but her father (Danny McBride) just doesn’t get her. He thinks it isn’t right that the family is so involved with their handheld screens all the time. So he changes Katie’s plans to fly to California and instead make it into a family road trip with Mom (Maya Rudolph) and son Aaron (Michael Rianda, also the writer and director), who also happens to be obsessed with everything dinosaurs. Katie is more connected to brother Aaron than to either Dad or Mom. These plans are upset when the next generation AI device, a mobile robot is announced by CEO tech wizard Mark Bowman (Eric Andre), which angers the digital assistant app known as PAL (voiced by the amazing Olivia Colman). PAL takes control of the thousands of gleaming robots and sets about on her plan to capture and enslave the entire human population. (Will we never learn what happens when robots are given the capability of AI?) The movie can be described as The Fabelmans meets Terminator. Somehow the Mitchell family along with their ugly pug dog, Doug escape capture, thus it is up to them to defeat PAL and rescue humanity. Entertaining comedy and action follow as the dysfunctional family must work together and come up with plans to battle the robots and find their way to the lair of PAL. They are aided by a couple of malfunctioning robots (voiced by Beck Bennett and Fred Armison) who see something redeeming in the humans. It’s an imaginative take on our dependence on our digital devices and the importance of remaking connections with our family and friends. There is plenty of cartoon violence that can be enjoyed by all audiences.

Luca

Luca       3 ½ stars

Luca, the animated feature from Pixar/Disney and directed by Enrico Casarosa, takes the theme of The Little Mermaid and puts it on the Italian Riviera. Thus we get some Italian flavor including a seaside village, some homemade tagliatelle, and riding bicycles over cobblestone streets. We also see a friendship formed between two young boys, the younger one being Luca and the older one is Alberto. They have a secret though. They are both sea monsters who are masquerading as humans. It seems that these creatures who live in the sea are occasionally glimpsed by humans from the village but after they leave the sea and dry off they can transform into human form and have the ability to walk and speak normally. This experience creates the desire in Luca to learn all about his new surroundings including to ride a Vespa and to make friends with a local human girl, Giulia. Unfortunately, for our sea monster friends they are under constant threat of getting wet which can make them change back to monster form and be revealed to the humans. It has some other elements similar to other Pixar movies like a local bully and a climactic event like a bicycle race so is not particularly original, but should be very enjoyable for the younger audience. Luca is not Toy Story but is worth a look.

You Hurt My Feelings

You Hurt My Feelings     4 ½ stars

The new movie You Hurt My Feelings, written and directed by Nicole Holofcener first premiered at Sundance this past year and was one of those I heard good things about but didn’t get the chance to see. Now it is in theaters and thankfully can be seen and appreciated by movie fans. The previous Holofcener movies I have seen, Friends with Money, Please Give and Enough Said all have a special comedic style. They feature relationships between people that care for each other and have conversations where slight amusing cuts are made between them. They are not cute but also are not vicious; they are for the most part honest. In this movie Beth (Julia Louis Dreyfus), a writer and writing instructor is happily married to Don (Tobias Menzies), a therapist. Beth has written a memoir about her relationship with her father that was a success and is now working on a work of fiction but can’t get a publisher to accept it. Her sister, Sarah (Michaela Watkins) is an interior designer and is married to Mark (Arian Moayed), a stage actor. The couple discuss everyday things and go about their jobs until one day Beth and Sarah accidentally overhear Don telling Mark that he thinks Beth’s new book is awful but is afraid to tell her that and instead only gives her more encouragement. This causes great distress for Beth but she is afraid to say anything and is now worried that her marriage is all a lie. All of this is handled in comedic style with the combination of Holofcener and Dreyfus giving us plenty to laugh at. Dreyfus’s acting here is not at all like her angry character in Veep. She plays it more subdued and really brings out Beth’s insecurities toward everything. Holofcener and Dreyfus worked together previously on Enough Said and it’s great to see them collaborating again in a light comedy. I find Julia Louis Dreyfus to be one of the funniest actresses working today. This pair working together has given us a real gem of a comedy.

No Hard Feelings

No Hard Feelings              2 stars

After taking some time off to be a mom, actress Jennifer Lawrence of The Hunger Games and X-Men fame tries her acting chops in the R rated raunchy sex comedy No Hard Feelings, written and directed by Gene Stupnitsky. We know that Lawrence can hold her own in comedies. (Remember the David O. Russell movies Silver Linings Playbook and American Hustle?) Here she takes on the role of an older woman trying to “date” an introverted nineteen-year names Percy who is about to go to Princeton. It seems that his rich parents, (Laura Benanti and Matthew Broderick) are worried about his lack of experience with women so they put an ad on Craig’s List offering a Buick to a woman who would try to bring Percy (Andre Barth Feldman) out of his shell. Maddie (Lawrence) is in trouble financially since all the rich people moving into town have been forcing her property taxes up, so she is willing to try out this offer. Lawrence can deliver on the comedy which includes a few amusing physical bits, but there is something lacking in the writing making it not feel very authentic. It doesn’t go as far as many raunchy comedies like The Sweetest Thing or Neighbors, but it’s also not quite a romantic comedy given the premise. It feels predictable too as Percy is not supposed to know of this arrangement, but it is inevitable that he will find out, which of course he does. There are also a number of appearances by supporting cast that seem to go nowhere, making me wonder why they were even there. (What was the point for Kyle Mooney to be here?) Unless you are a real Jennifer Lawrence fan you can pass this one up and not lose much. You should check out the movie Causeway from earlier this year that featured Lawrence with Brian Tyree Henry.