Jane (Katherine Heigl) is the living embodiment of the old saying "always a bridesmaid, never a bride." Just when she thinks her life can't get any lonlier, her sister Tess (Malin Akerman) announces her engagement to the man of Jane's dreams. But which sibling will eventually end up standing at the altar first?
Cast Katherine Heigl, James Marsden, Malin Akerman, Edward Burns, Melora Hardin, Judy Greer
Director(s) Anne Fletcher
Writer(s) Aline Brosh McKenna
Status In theaters (wide)
Genre(s) Comedy
Release Date Jan. 18, 2008
Running Time 107 minutes
Web Site 27dressesthemovie.com
Who's in It: Katherine Heigl, Malin Akerman, Edward Burns, James Marsden, Judy Greer
The Basics: Heigl hoards bridesmaid dresses and secretly loves her boss (Burns) who, in turn, is about to marry Heigl's sister. Meanwhile, Marsden worms his way into Heigl's life just so he can write a mean-spirited newspaper article about her. Who do you think winds up falling in love? Guess! Go on, guess!
What's the Deal? Welcome to 2008, an enlightened time when women aren't obsessed with weddings and willing to waste years of their lives secretly pining for male-genitalia-having blocks of wood; a time of assertive, interesting, vibrant women who've absorbed the lessons of their hippie feminist mothers and realized that no man who uses them and lies to them and publicly humiliates them is worth one more second of however much time he's been given. Except in this movie, which takes place in Crazy Backwards Shallow Values Land and where everyone's a moron.
What You Finally Learn About Heigl's Character From Watching the Part Where They Show You All the Dresses and a Montage of the Weddings Where She Wore Them: That she has a lot of wacky, interesting friends, none of whom seem to share anything in common with Heigl's blank-slate personality, made up of 50 percent pretty and 50 percent nice.
Who Makes You Wish It Was About Her Instead: Greer. She's the smarter, funnier, loves-to-drink-and-have-sex friend of Heigl's that they bring in to liven things up from time to time. Her fate is to be single. But when the alternative is to be married to bores like Marsden's or Burns' characters, you wind up envying her.
Advice for the Star That She'll Never Read:
Dear Katherine,
In your recent Vanity Fair interview you say that Knocked Up "paints women as shrews" and as "humorless." But you know what? At least the female characters in that movie had personalities. This one paints its heroine as a simpering fool who's easily manipulated and then throws away her own dignity for the sake of getting a man. Gross. Find a better script next time. Even if it's written by Judd Apatow.
26.2.08
27 DRESSES
DEFINITELY, MAYBE
As a father (Ryan Reynolds) goes through a difficult divorce, his young daughter (Abigail Breslin) starts questioning him on his entire romantic history. So, he tells her the tale of the three great loves of his life and she must guess which woman eventually became her mother. Is it the sweet-as-pie girl-next-door Emily (Elizabeth Banks)? His best friend (Isla Fisher)? Or the flaky journalist (Rachel Weisz)?
Cast Ryan Reynolds, Isla Fisher, Derek Luke, Abigail Breslin, Rachel Weisz, Elizabeth Banks
Director(s) Adam Brooks
Writer(s) Adam Brooks
Status In theaters (wide)
Genre(s) Comedy
Release Date Feb. 14, 2008
Running Time 105 minutes
Web Site definitelymaybemovie.com
Who's in It: Ryan Reynolds, Abigail Breslin, Derek Luke, Kevin Kline, Rachel Weisz, Isla Fisher, Elizabeth Banks
The Basics: If Reynolds ever happens to wind up as your dad in some sort of Freaky Friday-esque body-switching accident, it's imperative that you never ask him to tell you a bedtime story. Because he will. And it'll be all about how he met your mommy. And it'll take two hours. And that story will include a lot of sex details — actual line uttered by Breslin: "Daddy, what's a threesome?" — and will also somehow be the most sleep-inducing tale ever told. You'll get more somnolent satisfaction out of a cup of warm milk and a chocolate chip cookie.
What's the Deal? What if there were no bland white people in the world? Would romantic comedies suddenly star Mr. T and Shilpa Shetty? Or would America Ferrera just step in and pick up the slack? Anyway, I guess it's not the whiteness I'm having a problem with here, it's the empty-box zero amounts of interesting being piled invisibly high onscreen. Should the handsome guy pick this hot lady? Or this one? Or maybe this one? Is there a good reason for any of them to actually like each other for more than purely physical reasons? Even their environment has been stripped of anything that would make you know it as New York City. It's like they just shot this on the Friends set.
Lies Lies Lies, Yeah: Let's say you're a fan of those Richard Curtis-style movies from England like Four Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill and Love, Actually. And let's say you've seen the ads for this one where they practically rub your whole face in the fact that it's "From the makers of … (!!!)" those films. Well, that's false. It's from the same production company. And the only British people here are doing American accents.
Politics? What Politics? A good chunk of the plot is devoted to the recent past of the 1992 Clinton campaign for president. And the characters are, for the most part, politically aware, socially concerned people. But zero mention is made of the fact that something else happened after Clinton. And none of the people onscreen can be seen or heard caring about any of it. It's all about their dull little romantic travails. I didn't think I could dislike these nincompoops any more than I did in the first 60 minutes, but it actually creates an environment where that is possible.
CHARLIE BARTLETT
Anton Yelchin comes up with the perfect plan to win friends after moving to a new school: He becomes his classmates' "psychiatrist" — and freely dispenses questionable advice. The new kid in school (Anton Yelchin) hits upon a unique way to make friends: He becomes a classroom psychologist dispensing advice to the student body. Now, if only he can honor his own counsel.
Cast Anton Yelchin, Robert Downey Jr., Hope Davis, Kat Dennings, Tyler Hilton, Jake Epstein
Director(s) John Poll
Writer(s) Gustin Nash
Status In theaters (wide)
Genre(s) Comedy
Release Date Feb. 22, 2008
Running Time 97 minutes
Web Site charliebartlett-themovie.com
Who's in It: Anton Yelchin, Hope Davis, Robert Downey Jr.
The Basics: Hey, parents, remember that loveable, irrepressible Ferris Bueller? Remember how his big rebellion was skipping school and going to an art museum and eating pancreas, lip-synching to a Beatles song and then crashing an expensive car? Well now, he's a drug dealer, giving your kids prescription anti-depressants while the clueless adults all around him let it happen right under their noses.
What's the Deal? It's tough to know what to say about a movie like this. On the one hand, anti-drug hysteria in this country is such a joke that it's a joke that's not even funny anymore. If drugs were all that bad, reggae wouldn't exist and there wouldn't be a medical-marijuana store on every block in my Los Angeles neighborhood. On the other hand, I personally know of a 17-year-old who overdosed and died because some moronic teen dealer she knew gave her some toxic stuff. So instead, why don't we just talk about whether the movie is funny or not? And the answer is: sorta.
What's Good: Yelchin is a likeable Ferris clone (I'd say "2.0," but the teen rebel is such a cliché that there've been countless numbers of them on screens before and after Matthew Broderick), and he carries the whole movie with a bounce that lesser young actors would have turned into smug jerkfaceness.
What's Not: All the stock characters and their stock problems (popularity being the all-time No. 1 "issue" that never seems to go away) get wrapped up a little too neatly because, above all, this is a film that wants to be cute first, satirical second.
Who Wins: As always, Hope Davis. Here she's the boozy, out-of-it mom who treats her son more like a surrogate mate than a child she's supposed to be raising. Think Annette Bening in Running With Scissors but much less hammy and psychotic.
WITLESS PROTECTION
Larry the Cable Guy tries to do the right thing by saving a beautiful "kidnapped" woman (Ivana Milicevic) but gets pursued by a team of crooked FBI agents for his troubles. A small-town sheriff (Larry the Cable guy) is just doing his job when he stops what he thinks is two men kidnapping a woman (Ivana Milicevic). However, the "kidnappers" claim to be FBI agents who are only escorting their charge to a major trial in Chicago, so the sheriff lets them go. Later on, the lawman discovers that the agents are actually dirty and really are trying to kill the witness.
Cast Larry the Cable Guy, Ivana Milicevic, Yaphet Kotto, Peter Stormare, Eric Roberts, Joe Mantegna
Director(s) Charles Robert Carner
Writer(s) Charles Robert Carner
Status In theaters (wide)
Genre(s) Comedy
Release Date Feb. 22, 2008
Running Time 97 minutes
Web Site witlessprotectionmovie.com
Who's in It: Larry the Cable Guy, Jenny McCarthy, Ivana Milicevic, Peter Stormare, Joe Mantegna
The Basics: Larry the Cable Guy accidentally kidnaps Ivana Milicevic (model turned funny character actress; you've seen her before) because he thinks he's saving her from shady-looking men who've already abducted her. In reality, she's in witness protection and her "kidnappers" were FBI guys. What's Larry to do but whisk her off himself to solve the actual crime that's really going on and dumbly save the day?
What's the Deal? If I believed in such a thing as guilty pleasure then I guess Larry the Cable Guy's live-action-film output (Cars doesn't count) would be just that. Because his films are all, without exception, horrible pieces of crap. But since I don't think guilt serves any purpose in life, or that D-list Internet film critics like me serve much more purpose, I know that I have nothing to lose in terms of credibility or respect of my peers by announcing my love of this man's movies. They are crass, they are sub-lowest-common-denominator "funny," they are obvious, they seem barely written. And I want to stress that I'm not enjoying these films ironically. I'm not even saying that they're so bad they're good. I'm saying I laugh. I laugh a lot. Out loud. I don't know why. But I do. It feels good to confess this.
Trying to Explain Myself. It Won't Work. But I'll Try: I like how he's in on the joke — this idiotic redneck bubba is a fictional creation after all, just go find some of his old pre-"Larry" standup routines online, because they're out there and, believe me, you like him better as "Larry" than you will as Dan Whitney in a jacket with padded shoulders — and that he gets to revel in and mock his own character. He's not Peter Sellers; he's Jim Varney's less clever, half-naked spawn (It's funny because he's fat), and these films are this generation's Ernest Scared Stupid.
Favorite Parts: Well there's the bit on the pig farm. Wacky-antics-with-pigs is always good fun. But I think I like the fact that Peter Stormare and Joe Mantegna are here doing awful accents and pretending that they believe in the material. Or the fact that Jenny McCarthy will do anything.
What to Grade This Movie? You see the letter C up at the top of the review. That's what they call an "average" in math class. Because it's actually an F movie. But I had an A time.
20.2.08
FOOL'S GOLD
Kate Hudson has dumped broke hubby Matthew McConaughey's treasure-hunting butt, yet he still thinks if he finally finds that one big score he can ultimately win her back. Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson are married treasure hunters on the brink of divorce, but they can stay together if they find one last big fortune.
Cast Matthew McConaughey, Kate Hudson, Donald Sutherland, Ewen Bremner, Alexis Dziena, Kevin Hart
Director(s) Andy Tennant
Writer(s) John Claflin, Daniel Zelman, Andy Tennant
Status In theaters (wide)
Genre(s) Comedy
Release Date Feb. 8, 2008
Running Time 113 minutes
MPAA Rating PG-13 - for action violence, some sexual material, brief nudity and language
Web Site Official Site foolsgoldmovie.com
REVIEW
Who's in It: Matthew McConaughey, Kate Hudson, Donald Sutherland, Ewen Bremner, Alexis Dziena, Ray Winstone
The Basics: If only these basics were basic enough to explain in a couple of sentences. But there's, like, 27 things going on. Essentially, McConaughey (still shirt-phobic, still the chief purveyor of his now-patented "J.K. Livin'" way of being) and Hudson are bickering lovers on a treasure hunt that also involves an Eastern-European sidekick, a superrich guy on a yacht, his Paris Hilton-like daughter, a rival treasure hunter, an evildoing rapper/crime lord, that rapper/crime lord's bumbling assistants (one of whom is grown-up Theo from The Cosby Show gone rasta) and a pair of gay chefs.
What's the Deal? What I liked about this monumentally dumb film is how willing the filmmakers were to include every single idea they had, even if they only touch on that idea once. If a movie could be described as having Tourette's syndrome, this is the one. Is it a romantic comedy? An adventure? Stupidly convoluted? Is there a plotline in here about how the rich guy and his daughter need to learn how to love one another? Do lots of people get murdered? Are there funny accents? Multiple concussions? Secret chambers stocked with clue-containing manuscripts? Hudson making sure that everyone else in the cast knows that McConaughey is a pile-driving sex machine, whether they asked or not? Yes, yes and more yes.
McConaughey's Favorite Part: When, for an entire shot, all that happens is M.M. reclining and stretching out to relax for a bit, and the camera slowly glides along his ripped torso, and the light hits it just so. And that's it. Nothing else happens in the shot. So weird. But I want to know if when he sees that sort of thing on a big screen, is that like porn to him? Because it actually evoked laughter in the theater.
Favorite Parts: Every time Hudson clocks McConaughey in the head with a rock or shovel or cane. I was also a fan of the interminable explanation scene where everyone sits around on jillionaire Sutherland's yacht and explains the complicated and boring history of the treasure they're all hunting. The camera jumps frantically from talking actor to talking actor, and every person onscreen does that thing where they go, "But here's where it all gets wild, see … " except none of it is wild. Or makes any sense.