A SIMPLE FAVOR

Anna Kendrick     Blake Lively     Henry Golding

Ian Ho     Joshua Satine     Jean Smart     Rupert Friend

     Ah yes, a simple favor indeed.  This comedic drama is fun to watch with all the baits and switches leading down one path and then another and with plenty of comedy that stays just short of slapstick.  The entertaining novel by Darcy Bell, on which Jessica Sharzer has based her screenplay, has been translated to the screen by the multi-talented director Paul Feig. It maintains the Gone Girl type of intrigue and suspense about a missing woman, with crafty plotting that keeps the viewer rapt in trying to figure out what is what and who is who.  

     But most ingenious is the casting of Anna Kendrick to be the naïve do-gooder/housewife-vlogger who ends up also being an astute detective and sly manipulator. We knew Kendrick could be funny, as in Drinking Buddies, and could show dramatic flair, as in Up in the Air; but her skill here in being an endearing figure you initially smile at but one who will eventually be a sharp-witted, rational plotter, and sexy is truly impressive.  Blake Lively is very much a counterpart foil playing the attractive, cold, bad girl who feels free to say and do anything she pleases.  When the two are onscreen together, sparks fly—sometimes in attraction, sometimes in competition. Clearly, the two actors are having fun with their acting skills in every scene.

     The story begins in a grade school setting with Stephanie (Kendrick) being the stereotypical mom who is known for her cooking, crafts, and enthusiastic volunteering and, by the way, has her own vlog in which she cooks and throws out helpful hints and other thoughts about—anything.  When her son Miles (Satine) makes friends with Nicky (Ho), she and Nicky’s mother Emily (Lively) are drawn together, Stephanie to Emily’s worldliness (no rules, no “I’m sorry”s) and Emily to Stephanie’s innocence (“You’re so nice I don’t know how you’ve survived this long”).  As you would expect, Stephanie’s son is polite and well behaved, whereas Nicky is volatile and freely uses the f-word. Ian Ho’s acting-out role allows him to show his theatrical talent, which he does very convincingly.

     The relationship between the two women is fascinating throughout in its mixture of mutual awe, admiration, wonderment, and daring.  This is the aspect of the film I appreciated the most. Both women represent the typical American woman with many layers and dimensionality in their personalities.  With his keen understanding of women, this drama is a perfect one for Paul Feig to direct.  We immediately recognize Stephanie, but we need background information about Emily to develop even a modicum of sympathy—and respect—for her. We get that with the well conceived script and story line.

     A Simple Favor keeps going on and on until it becomes absurd toward the end, but it doesn’t lose any of its entertainment value even so.

 A movie with laughs, intrigue, and thrills that will make you chuckle afterwards, even while you shake your head.

Grade:  B+                                    By Donna R. Copeland

TABLE 19

Anna Kendrick   Lisa Kudrow   Margo Martindale   Craig Robinson  

Tony Revolori   June Squibb   Stephen Merchant   Wyatt Russell

     This is a strange movie that doesn’t quite get off the ground.  It’s rather formulaic, as in quick alterations between humor, anger/meanness, tenderness, and love.  It tries to be funny by being shocking, but the jokes often fall flat, or are even embarrassing—as when a young man asks a girl he’s never met to go out with him and marry him…and, by the way, he has a big penis.  Stumbling, pratfalls, and bumping into things and wrecking things are likewise inserted to be funny.  There must be at least five or six people who fall down, and we’re supposed to laugh.  And the fighting between couples; this gets very tiresome. 

     The film takes place at a wedding, and opens with Eloise (Kendrick) vacillating between accepting or declining the invitation.  This is actually one of the more clever scenes showing real anguish and ambivalence; Kendrick can be very funny.  She is right to be torn because she’s bound to run into her ex-boyfriend Teddy (Russell), the brother of the bride with a new girlfriend.  She wants to go because she is a long-term friend of the bride, and was even helping with wedding plans when she and Teddy broke up.  Of course, in the end she decides to go, and is seated at Table 19.  We’re informed ahead of time that this is a table of misfits.

     The colorful make-up of the guests at Table 19 is a great set-up for a comedy.  Along with Eloise, there is the former nanny of the bride and her brother, Jo (Squibb); unhappily married owners of a diner (Kudrow and Robinson); an ex-con (Merchant) who is the uncle of the bride, and a young man (Revolori) desperately wanting to score, inappropriately egged on by his helicopter mother (Martindale) whom we only hear over the telephone.  This table is supposed to form the essence of the comedy, and some of their routines are as madcap as they’re supposed to be, but the filmmakers (writers Jay and Mark Duplass and director Jeffrey Blitz) never quite succeed in their aim to make this an all-out screwball comedy.  Which is a shame, since the cast is filled with talented actors. 

     Table 19 succeeds when it illuminates the back-stories of the characters, and we feel compassion for what they’ve gone through.  This is especially true of the ex-con when we hear what he did wrong, which is both funny and extremely touching at the same time.  Merchant pulls this off like the pro that he is.  Revolori (a hit in The Grand Budapest Hotel) plays his part extremely well, but the lines he’s given, which are supposed to be funny, simply aren’t.  Kudrow and Robinson are fine actors, but there is no chemistry between them, and it’s puzzling how the two characters could have gotten into a marriage.  Kendrick also does well, but it’s a role she has done many times before in playing characters that I suspect are very similar to her as a person.  I would like to see her pick up the challenge of roles that will be out of character for her, proving her great acting abilities.

Table 19 is mildly entertaining, but doesn’t achieve the sidesplitting screwball comedy to which it aspires.

Grade:  C-                                    By Donna R. Copeland

TROLLS

Voices of:  Anna Kendrick   Justin Timberlake   Christopher Mintz-Plasse   Zooey Deschanel  

Christine Baranski   Russell Brand   John Cleese   James Corden   Jeffrey Tambor

       I think kids will really take to this animation with simple messages that will be meaningful to them, delivered in eye-catching, colorful visual effects.  The message is basically pitting “look on the bright side of life” against “look out; they’re out to get you.”  And further, that true happiness is inside all of us; it’s up to us to find it.  The film also demonstrates that making friends of enemies is ultimately life-saving.

       The story is that the Trolls are too exuberant with their singing, dancing, and hugs which are put forth by King Peppy (Tambor) and his daughter Poppy (Kendrick).  For good reason, which we find out why later, Poppy’s friend Branch (Timberlake) turns away from what he sees is nonsense and further endangers the Trolls because their loud parties inform the Bergens of their whereabouts.  Bergens are dour beings who are huge grouches, convinced that eating Trolls is the only way they can be happy.

         Despite Branch’s warnings, the Bergen king’s chef (Baransky) who has been banished because she hasn’t served Trolls for 20 years sees and hears the partygoers and manages to grab a half dozen of them to take back to King Gristle (Mintz-Plasse), thereby getting back into his good graces.  King Gristle is too young to have ever tasted Troll happiness and was told by his father (Cleese) that he never would.  Her bounty certainly does get her forgiven, and she is gleeful with her newly regained power.

     Meanwhile, Poppy feels guilty about not listening to Branch’s warning, and feels responsible for the Trolls that got into the Chef’s hands.  The Troll mantra, “No Troll left behind”, prompts her to go to the land of the Bergens and rescue her friends.  At first, Branch refuses to go with her, but does show up on the trail, knowing that Poppy will need his help.  Most of the rest of the film is about their ruses and adventures in rescuing the prisoners, which involves making friends with the scullery maid Bridget (Deschanel) and doing a little matchmaking.

       The soundtrack has a number of original songs, the most important being “Can’t Stop the Feeling” by Justin Timberlake (who served as music producer), which won Best Song from the Hollywood Film Awards.  The singers include Timberlake, Anna Kendrick, Zooey Deshanel, Gwen Stefani, and James Cordon along with others.  Paul Simon’s “The Sound of Silence” is inserted during a key moment, drawing chuckles from the audience.  The original score is by Christophe Beck. 

       Cinematographer Young Duk Jhun, who has had experience with visual effects (The Croods, Monsters vs. Aliens, and Over the Hedge) is joined by the Production, Art, Visual Effects, and Animation artists to create a beautifully rendered show, brought together by Co-directors Mike Mitchell and Walt Dohm (with previous contributions to Shrek and SpongeBob SquarePants films).  The ways in which the Trolls use their hair is definitely clever sometimes humorous, and part of the fascination in Trolls.

Although not a groundbreaker, the music, visual and special effects, and heartwarming messages, gives Trolls high entertainment value, particularly for young children.

Grade:  B                                    By Donna R. Copeland

THE ACCOUNTANT

Ben Affleck   Anna Kendrick   J. K. Simmons   Jeffrey Tambor   John Lithgow   Cynthia Addai-Robinson   Jon Bernthal

          Don’t let the title mislead you; this is a crafty, entertaining thriller with rapid plot twists and shifting identities.  Not what you ever imagined an accountant’s life to be like.  But Christian Wolff (Affleck), the accountant in this story, grew up “different” (Asperger’s Syndrome, a form of autism) with a military father who pushed him to overcome weakness and deal with taunts and bullying he was encountering.  Training included fostering his innate talent for numbers, family loyalty, martial arts and target practice.  So Christian (take note of the name’s associations) then becomes a fairly unique individual with Robinhood values, which makes this film a character study as well as an action thriller, showing the influence of early family relationships and events on adulthood in this and other characters.

          Director Gavin O’Connor enhances the mystery quotient by jumping back and forth in time [which I normally detest, but it works here], showing events in Christian’s life and an FBI investigation.  Mystery is inserted by withholding reasons why, for instance, FBI Director Raymond King (Simmons) is pursuing a perp he calls “The Accountant”, and charges one of his supervisees, Marybeth Medina (Addai-Robinson), to smoke this guy out.  (We’re given satisfaction later as to its importance to him.)

          It’s an amazing—although still plausible—story involving a savant mathematician, big corporations, underworld crime, FBI investigations, and a young well-meaning accountant (Kendrick) who unwittingly blows the whistle at a prominent company, thereby setting off a chain of events no one expects.

          O’Connor has done extremely well in putting Bill Dubuque’s screenplay on film, using their combined knowledge of cinema, human psychology and families to create a compelling tale that is more than a simple thriller.  This film would not have worked nearly as well without the personal histories of Christian, Ray, and Marybeth; they fit together exquisitely with—something I loved—a kind of tenderness running through.  On top of all this, there is a “coming together” at the end, which is priceless. 

         The actors are well cast, with the ever-talented Ben Affleck taking the lead, but with strong support from Anna Kendrick, J. K. Simmons, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Jeffrey Tambor, and John Lithgow.  Each one of these actors has stellar performances in showing their vulnerabilities:  Affleck as an autistic, Kendrick as a bright but repressed artist-mathematician, Simmons as an FBI agent with insight and heart, Addai-Robinson as one whose secret is outed but hopes diligence will save her, Tambor as an inmate who’s reformed and has acquired character, and Lithgow who is gobsmacked by just about everything going on around him.

       Mark Isham’s music and Seamus McGarvey’s cinematography are the behind-the-scenes enhancements that help make this film significant. 

This film has all the elements that many of us go to the movies for.

Grade:  A                                    By Donna R. Copeland

THE HOLLARS

Margo Martingale   Richard Jenkins   John Krasinski   Anna Kendrick   Sharito Copley   Josh Groban   Charlie Day

          In his debut as director of a feature length film, John Krasinski has done a creditable job in steering a fine group of actors through a comedic drama that has its highs and lows.  The uneven script by James C. Strouse deals with weighty emotional issues in a sometimes ridiculous dysfunctional family, but goes over the top in the absurd and misses chances for substantive insights—something like what many family sitcoms do, pulling for easy laughs without spending time to be genuine and serious.

         John (Krasinski) is called away suddenly to his mother’s (Martindale) bedside when it is determined that she has a brain tumor.  Her husband Don (Jenkins), an ineffectual man, is despite a good heart, child-like and tearful.  John’s brother Ron (Copley), who is just about as inept, lives at home and is without a job since his father fired him from their failing plumbing business.  John has soaked up a bit of this low self-confidence from his family, and even though he is in a happy relationship with his wife Rebecca (Kendrick) and is expecting a baby, he is intimidated by her family’s wealth.

        The family’s pathology emerges in full force upon the central figure’s serious illness, especially son Ron, who spies on his ex-wife (with binoculars outside her house!), has inappropriate interactions with his kids, and seems to have zero problem-solving abilities.  (As an aside, Josh Groban as a youth minister now married to Ron’s former wife, comes across as a most appealing and patient character who puts religion in a good light.)  Don does a bit better in getting a job in a liquor store as a last-ditch effort to save his company.  John doesn’t seem to have the foggiest notion of how to support Rebecca emotionally, but fortunately she knows enough to guide him gradually in the right direction.  All of these issues comprise the bulk of the comedy of the film, and I realize many people do appreciate this kind of humor.  It borders too much on the absurd for me.

        Martindale continues to be a star in whichever role she is in on TV or in the movies.  Jenkins is a good pairing for her; their timing and obvious emotional connection constitutes much of what is best in the film.  Krasinski and Kendrick as a younger duo are not quite so well connected, but she is very convincing as a hugely pregnant wife with a stable personality and ability to express her emotions.  Copley and Day do well with the comedic, ridiculous lines they are given, but much of that material is over the top.

A light-weight comedy with some heavy emotional situations.

Grade:  C                                    By Donna R. Copeland

MIKE AND DAVE NEED WEDDING DATES

Zac Efron     Adam Devine     Aubrey Plaza     Anna Kendrick

          Mike (Devine) and Dave (Efron) need much more than wedding dates in this film.  Their parents and sister and her fiancé sit down for a serious talk before the occasion, which will take place in Hawaii, and they beg them not to ruin still another family get-together.  They’re shown videotapes of their bad behavior in the past, and after being defensive, they listen to their sister’s plea.  The family believes that if the two bring “nice girls” as dates, it will have a taming effect on them.

          I suppose that it’s no accident that this movie is like an extended sitcom—and a bad one that seems never-ending—because the experience of the director (Jake Szymanski) and writers (Andrew J. Cohen and Brendan O’Brien) has been primarily in television.  It’s a predictable farce, with the young men getting dates, Tatiana (Plaza) and Alica (Kendrick), who are as bad as they are in real life (e.g., they have just been fired from their waitress jobs for coming to work drunk).  They have schemed to get invited and are just looking for a “vaca.”  So original—not!  So funny—not!

       The writers seemed to have no boundaries in coming up with “pranks” to ruin a wedding; it seems like whatever they thought of that would be terrible to happen at a wedding, they put in the script.  Of course, drugs and alcohol play a large role, along with lying, screaming, and conniving with little thought given to consequences.  This gets very tiresome as scene after scene intended to be funny falls flat, either because it’s expected or because it’s too cruel/awkward/crude.

          Given the roles presented to them, the actors do a credible job in acting their parts.  Efron and Devine do come across as brothers with a mix of competitiveness and love, and Plaza and Kendrick as women at sea not knowing what to do with their lives.  When they get serious, the characters are mildly interesting, but they inevitably end up looking one-dimensional—any change that transpires appears to be magical.  In that vein, the story ends illogically in that all of the incompetent doofuses end up being organized, effective heroes after all the havoc they’ve wrought.

            I see no reason for anybody anywhere at any time to see this movie, and there are a ton of reasons not to see it.  To name a few:  It glorifies alcohol and drugs, it glorifies foolhardy risk-taking and impulsivity, it contains constant yelling and swearing and has a paucity of soul searching, thoughtful contemplation.  Someone might reply to this, “It’s entertainment!  It doesn’t have to have any depth or serious thought.”  My reply?  “It doesn’t?” 

Skip this movie; it will be bad for you.

Grade:  F                                    By Donna R. Copeland

GET A JOB

Miles Teller     Anna Kendrick     Bryan Cranston     Alison Brie     Marcia Gay Harden

          If you value quality filmmaking, stay as far away from this film, Get a Job, as you can.  It’s about a heart-breaking event that far too many people are experiencing today—losing their job—and this movie wants to make a comedy of that; moreover people’s getting jobs in the end has no logical bearing on their attempts to get a job or their performance once landing one.  It’s a shame that it wastes an excellent cast on a silly story. 

        A group of guys live in a rented house smoking bongs, playing video games, reading porn, drinking beer, and in between applying for jobs.  Will (Teller) is one of these and in a serious relationship with Jillian (Kendrick) who has just secured a job she is excited about.  She is not featured much in the film, except that when she comes to live in the house she is stereotypically cleaning it up and eventually gets drawn into the boys’ activities. 

        Will is set up to be one of the wonder boys in the action, and although it doesn’t appear he does much of substance, he gets hired by a boss who was impressed with one of his videos about a pimp, and he is subsequently promoted by a controlling, flirtatious, bossy woman (again, a stereotype) (Harden).  He has doubled his salary in no time.

        To pull in the older crowd, we learn about Will’s father (Cranston), who loses his senior position after 30 years at a company, and Will begins to offer his videotaping services to assist him in his search for something new. 

      Get a Job doesn’t really have a message—at least I couldn’t detect one.  There is a harangue about school children getting awards for doing nothing, a glance at someone developing an app that allows someone to stalk someone else, and a bit about one of Will’s roommates making it big on Wall Street and being told not to worry about losing 50 million dollars—just to get back to work and earn it back.  The final outcome seems to be that you can make it big if you work in the porn business.

Get a Job needs to be canned.

Grade:  F                         By Donna R. Copeland

PITCH PERFECT 2

Anna Kendrick   Rebel Wilson   Hailee Steinfeld   Brittany Snow   Elizabeth Banks

I wouldn’t go so far as to say that Pitch Perfect 2 is “pitch perfect”, but the quality of the music and the catchy tunes make it entertaining and fun.  Certainly, the hundreds of spirited young girls in the audience tonight were highly approving judging by their frequent laughter and grooving with the songs.  It is a little too sweet and girly in places for my taste—almost embarrassingly so—but that didn’t keep me from enjoying it. 

      If you saw the first Pitch Perfect, this will be familiar to you in that an all-female a cappella singing group keeps winning prizes for their performances despite all the doubts of others.  The message is that if you have talent—despite public mistakes, have faith in yourself enough to flaunt it.  This “2” is a bit like The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel is to the first one—more of the same, but still entertaining.

      The writers (Kay Cannon, screenplay; Mickey Rapkin, novel) and Director Elizabeth Banks make sincere attempts to address current issues and controversies about race, gender, and sexual orientation by making jokes about them, but they are more often misses than hits.  Their most successful ones are spoken by Flo (Chrissie Fit), a Latina who humorously points out tragedies and close calls in her life that were so much worse than the situations other characters are dithering about at the time.   When someone says, “Is anybody scared?”, her reply with perfect timing is, “Not me; I’ve already lived longer than I ever expected.”  Where the joke falls flat is a time when someone starts to say, “I was…” and the other person says, “Oh, I thought you were going to say you were gay.”

That brings me to another off-putting aspect of the script, which is that some characters (John, played by John Michael Higgins; and Keegan-Michael Key, Beca’s boss) are overly snarky and cruel, rather than funny and clever as I assume they were intended to be.  Both snarky and cruel can be funny, but not in this script.  John makes some shockingly sexist comments about the Bellas that are so stereotypical—but since they are still adhered to by some in our society, are no longer funny.  Beca’s boss humiliates an intern continuously, which is supposed to be funny, I guess, but isn’t.

      I also thought the initial “disaster” for which the Bellas are going to be severely chastised is over the top.  It’s a little creepy to play up the event—such as it is—as a sexual no-no and then linking it to the historical Marilyn Monroe birthday song for President Kennedy.  Poor taste, I think.

     To me, the best part of this production is listening to the a cappella groups sing, along with Anna Kendrick’s singing and performing.  Another of the funny parts of the script is her trying to be snarky, which never comes off as biting; it just sounds dorky because Beca has so little hostility.  I also greatly enjoyed the Snoop Dogg segments; Beca’s mashing up his song without his apparently noticing was priceless.

Many will find this pitch perfect.

Grade:  C+                                                By Donna R. Copeland