The first is 500 Days of Summer, which I will write more about when it's up for a blog (which should be soon) but I have to say now that it was even better than I anticipated. I'd love to see it again. (Takers? Any?)
The second is a twofer: seeing my roommate and getting to go to the Rancid/Rise Against show. Besides having missed my bro immensely, we got to see two excellent bands and enjoy a mostly gorgeous day in Philly. Also, thanks to his new job in Newark, we can resume our plan of getting an apartment together. By the way, we don't call each other bro seriously; it's as a joke. I just had to clear that up.
Lot of tools at the show. Maybe that's what's had me particularly snippy the last few days. I'm talking wife-beater, roidin' out, drunk before the first band went on tools. Admittedly that detracted a bit from the experience.
Video for the day comes from an excellent song that was perfectly utilized in 500 Days of Summer. Anyone who's seen the trailer has probably heard snippets of it already. It's even better once you see the movie and hear the song in context, but it's pretty darn great on its own, as well. It's called Sweet Disposition by a band called Temper Trap.
Additionally, because I can only embed video into the blog, I am going to link to what I think is an excellent cover of one of my all time favorite songs--Paul Simon's Graceland. The band is Casiotone for the Painfully Alone (a mouthful of a name, I know) and the guy did a really cool warm electronic version of it. I just recently bought a 7" of the song because I love it so much (and anyone who knows me knows how much I love vinyl). If you feel like straying just one site away, check the song out here.
Blu-ray release of the day: School for Scoundrels. MOVING ON.
#18: Year One
I'm excited for the blog entry in which I can return to writing a good review. Spoiler alert: this isn't it.
I saw this for the same reason I saw Step Brothers: I thought it would be one of those movies where the trailer spews instances of popular slapstick humor when the film is actually filled with clever adlibbed banter from talented comedic actors. Step Brothers delivered, Year One did not.
It's not that I was miserable in the theater for the less-than-90-minute duration of the film, it's simply that about 98% of this movie simply wasn't funny. At first I couldn't figure out why. I was sitting in the theater bored and waiting for some scene that could salvage the entire movie, but then I realized what the hang-up was.
The problem here, I think, was that the creators of Year One couldn't decide if they wanted it to be a raunchy, irreverent teen comedy or a cute, good-natured family film. Had it subscribed to one and abandoned the other, I have every bit of faith that this could have turned into a good movie.
A good example of the former category would be the aforementioned Step Brothers. Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly must have been told "All right. Have at it." and beyond a loose script were probably given free reign to do what they want. If any pair can do raunchy well it's the two of them. They go over the top with a complete sense of awareness. They realize it isn't the raunchiness that makes the humor effective but rather the awkwardness with which its delivered. When one of the two spouts an angry, profanity-laden insult with complete certitude despite the fact that it doesn't quite make sense you know it's the context and not the content that is intended to be funny. I don't think people give Will Ferrell enough credit; he's been reduced to a shock-comedian rather than a genuinely intelligent artist. He's no Carlos Mencia. I firmly believe there's a method to his madness.
Year One could have used Will Ferrell. It needed him, in fact. The irreverent, inappropriate parts were made silly instead of awkward to the point where they were simply annoying. Having scenes in Sodom and Gomorrha seems incredibly promising; there is a copious amount of jokes to be made there. But resorting to an obviously intentional over-reptetition of the word "penis" doesn't bring the audience back to the days of being an immature middle-schooler but rather poses the question, "Would I have even thought this was funny back then?" I'm willing to guess that the answer is no. There was a distinct sense of holding back in the movie--as if they weren't willing to plant the film entirely in the realm of the humorously profane. So the parts in which they did indulge were out of place and, more importantly, poorly implemented. Rather than the delightful awkwardness one might find in Step Brothers, Year One became that class clown in high school too dull to ever get a laugh out of anyone.
Then there's the second category from which Year One misses the mark: the pleasant family flick. I think the perfect example of this is Night at the Museum (the first one, because I can't speak for the second). I wasn't expecting to enjoy the movie when I saw it, but it's so light-hearted and fun that you can't help but appreciate it. It's cutesie but not in an overly-sappy sort of way, and the jokes in the film have a manifest appeal to a younger audience but a latent meaning for adults--similar to Spongebob. Had the movie settled on this blueprint they could have used Jack Black's energy and Michael Cera's deadpan so much more effectively. The jokes that tried so hard to utilize whatever they could pull off with a PG-13 rating could have been left out and the film could have been devoted to clever biblical jokes, anachronisms, and the potentially rich juxtaposition of Michael Cera's perpetual uncertainty and Jack Black's senseless over-confidence.
The result of neglecting both of these standard comedic categories was an unquotable, unmemorable movie that largely wasted the talent of two good actors. There were two parts I can remember that I laughed at--coincidentally (or maybe not) one from each of the classifications I felt the movie tried to avoid. The potential was there, but what's good in theory clearly doesn't always work in practice.
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