Get Smart

Does it make a movie funnier if you have someone to watch it with? I laughed harder (and more often!) at Get Smart than any comedy I've seen in a long time. Even though it was really corny. (That's what Hud said about it, anyway). Maybe I'm just happy from all the tryptophan I ingested for Thanksgiving. No, wait, tryptophan makes you sleepy, not happy. I knew it was one of the dwarves, anyway.

I really think it's Steve Carrell's fault that I found this movie so hilarious. See, if I try to imagine Jim Carrey in the role as Max Smart I just get all annoyed. But Carrell, with his unexpected deadpan humor, is right up my alley. Although I must say I can't understand why they bothered to have Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson in this movie when he never even once takes his shirt off.

True Romance

I was expecting this to be basically the same movie as Kalifornia. I couldn't have been more wrong. My first clue was the music in the very first scene, which told me that this one would be comparatively light-hearted. My second clue was seeing that it was written by Quentin Tarantino. Although this was not the gem that was Pulp Fiction, it's pretty much a romantic comedy, Tarantino style.

Before watching, I didn't even realize Brad Pitt was in this one. (Do you sense a theme throughout the past few movies? Apparently I have reached the point in my netflix queue where I picked out all of the Brad Pitt movies I hadn't seen yet). It was kind of funny to see Pitt in a bit part as a Spicoli-esque stoner.

If I ever had any doubt before (and I may have, during The Fifth Element), this movie convinced me that Gary Oldman is amazing. I would never have believed he could pull off a dreadlocked pimp until I saw it with my own eyes.

Unfortunate that Samuel L. Jackson had such a brief part in this movie. Lucky for us, Tarantino saw the error of his ways and gave us Jules Winnfield a year later.

Kalifornia

Hud warned me I wasn't going to like this movie and for once he was wrong. His warning made me worry that this was going to be as awful as something like Silence of the Lambs (saw that in the theater in high school and it freaked me out so bad that I promised myself I would never watch it again) but, despite all the killings, it was nowhere near as bad as SoL, and I think I know why. See, there was kind of an excuse for the killings in this movie; Brad Pitt played an inbred hillbilly (is that what they call them in Kentucky? I thought that was more of an Arkansas thing) who was obviously not right in the head, and who murdered for money or "necessity" rather than "enjoyment." On the other hand, in SoL we have Hannibal Lecter who is highly intelligent and cultured, and very methodical and matter-of-fact in his killings, just the way a normal person would select a wine to go with their meal. It is much harder to understand why such an outwardly normal-seeming person would end up as a murderer, let alone a freakin' cannibal.

Anyway, this movie was nowhere near as horrifying as Silence of the Lambs, which makes me wonder if I should actually watch one of the Godfather movies. Hud warned me away from those too, knowing I really dislike movies that portray people at their most heartless and cruel, but I've heard so often how great all of those movies are.

I am still trying to decide if Brad Pitt did a good job with his character and accent or if it was more of a caricature. I think most of the time he did pretty well, until he would make one of his Beavis & Butthead grunting noises. One thing's for sure, I really didn't notice the pretty about him much in this flick.

The Devil's Own

You would think that Harrison Ford and Brad Pitt sharing the screen would hold my interest. I mean, all that's missing is Hugh Jackman, right? But alas, let's just say I was not glued to the screen, nor did I run to blog about it immediately. Chalk this up as one of the movies about which nothing stands out for me (other than Brad Pitt trying to do an Irish accent. I didn't think he did a too horribly awful job of it, but then again I'm not Irish. It does make me wonder, though, why they wouldn't let him try a British accent in Snatch. Either way--with an Irish accent here or as an unintelligible Pikey in Snatch--it works better than Kevin Costner's unapologetic American accent in Robin Hood).

Forgetting Sarah Marshall

Instead of bothering to write anything about this movie I'll just refer you to the first paragraph of this blog entry. Pretty much the whole thing applies (although this movie did veer into slightly depressing territory for a little bit before the happy ending).

Just a note: You definitely don't want to watch this movie with your kids (don't worry, I didn't!!), unless you want them to learn virtually every possible sexual position. This may apply to watching the movie with your mom, too.

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford

This DVD sat in my house for days just waiting for me to watch it. I was planning to watch it last Thursday night, but Hud saw it by the TV, picked it up, shook it at me and asked, "Have you actually watched this?" in a tone of disbelief. I told him I hadn't yet, but I planned to, and... why? His response: "This movie is really, really long and really, really boring, and... just really long and boring." (And, by the way, if the title of the movie could be any indication, I thought he might be right). Discouraged by this, I decided I needed sleep more than I needed to watch this movie Thursday night. I didn't regret that decision.

Of course, I knew I would eventually get around to watching this movie. I mean, it has Brad Pitt in it--how bad could it be? I should have at least been able to enjoy looking at him for a few hours. Although I do recall hearing his "Seven Years in Tibet" referred to as "Seven Years in My Seat," which kind of made me squirm uncomfortably every time I thought about popping this 2 hour and 39 minute movie into the DVD player.

Well, as it turns out, Hud was right. Not even Brad Pitt's über-sexiness could hold my interest in this movie. In fact, he wasn't even looking all that hot as Jesse James. The only remedy I could suggest for this flick is the one Toby Keith sang about 15 years ago: "a little less talk and a lot more action." I definitely would have preferred to spend 2 hours and 39 minutes reading the book I can't wait to get back to.

As I watched I found myself wondering why Bob Ford was referred to as a coward in the title of this movie. (This was between moments of wondering HOW much longer until the end??). I could see him being called a traitor, maybe, but he didn't seem any more cowardly than the next guy. I speculated that it could be because he shot an unarmed man who suspected (or expected?) that he was about to be killed, and because he wouldn't admit to Jesse's wife that he'd done it on purpose. While Ford may have killed James in a cowardly manner, it didn't sound fair to classify Ford as a coward based solely on that fact. But that thought did give me an idea. They should have made the title of this movie even longer and more boring: The Assassination of Jessie James in a Cowardly Manner by Robert Ford.

Of course watching the rest of the movie explained his label as a coward. First of all, that was the way the public came to view him. Sounds to me like they came to this conclusion based on the way he killed Jesse James, which was probably the only instance they had by which to judge him. Second of all (apocryphal though this may be) he all but admitted his cowardice to his girlfriend when he told her he shot James because he was scared that if he didn't, James would kill him first.

So we have determined that Robert Ford was a coward, and that I was an idiot for sitting through this movie. Lesson learned.