Meet Phil and Claire. Boring people with busy lives and eccentric offspring. They’re looking for a way to spice up they’re marriage. So they do what any other couple would do: seek therapy.
However, Phil (Steve Carell) and Claire (Tina Fey) have a different idea of what constitutes therapy: running from dirty cops and hitmen while bringing down a mob boss and a crooked politician. Who needs counseling when your life is in peril?
This movie would fail if it's only redeeming qualities were the wild stunts. The couple’s excape from central Park is peppered with humor, but it’s not believable. The chase sequence featuring Carrell crawling between the drivers seats of two cars welded together is beautifully shot - filled with suspense and witty dialog, but the whole thing reeks of improbability. The awkward dancing in the gentleman’s club leading to the ultimate end of the Foster’s adventure will make you laugh (or blush) yet it is so far beyond unlikely to be plausible in anyone’s imagination.
Yet this mash up of a romantic comedy and action thriller succeeds. I was amused and entertained. Date Night is a great movie for a date night.
What makes this movie work is the relationship between Phil and Claire. They’re normal people with an imperfect marriage and spastic children. They could be any of us. Their predictable dinner dates are much like the date nights of most married Americans. Their conversations (while being slightly funnier than the typical human) are natural and wholly believable as conversations that transpire between two married individuals. They react to stress like anyone else. And the many dangers they endure throughout the movie are not remedies, they’re reminders. This isn’t a movie about how Phil and Claire fix their marriage, it’s about how much Phil and Claire love each other. Whatever (hypothetically) happens after the final scene, they will still be boring people with busy lives and eccentric offspring. Yet they are busy and boring people in love.
Showing posts with label Steve Carell. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Steve Carell. Show all posts
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Horton Hears a Who!
Approached with some trepidation (Jim Carrey does not have a stellar track record with Dr. Seuss adaptions - not even a decent reputation) Horton delivers what the makers of Grinch and the sad Mike Meyers venture Cat in the Hat could not accomplish: a pleasant family comedy.
The story should be familiar to fans of the Dr. Seuss tale. Horton, an elephant (voiced by Carrey) that hears a cry of help from a tiny speck of dust, finds himself the protector of a microscopic planet that is home to the Whos. He befriends the Mayor of Whoville (Steve Carell) while creating foes of a grouchy kangaroo (Carol Burnett), bad Vlad (there is also a good Vlad that makes cookies), and a horde of malicious monkeys. Horton and the mayor are in the same boat. None of the other jungle animals believes Horton's speck is inhabited by tiny people - except a few kids who pretend to carry their own world on a flower (including one odd character who's world has a population of horses that "all eat rainbows, and poop butterflies"). No one in Whoville believes the mayor's warning that they are a speck of dust floating through space and that their world is in peril if a giant elephant can't guide them to safety.
The animation is not the best, but it maintains Seuss's imaginative style. There are several creative liberties within the film, but it stays true to the spirit of the book by using several of the most well known phrases through both dialog and narration (including the timeless "a person is a person, no matter how small"). And that one line is a great lesson for kids my son's age as well as kids my age. Sometimes it's nice to see Hollywood portray worthwhile values. Horton Hears a Who also encourages creative expression - my kids's specialty.
On the downside, there are several insults thrown around like monkeys flinging poop. (thankfully, the monkeys in the movie use bananas as ammunition rather than feces). While it's a worthy effort to teach younger kids that it's not nice to call people names, they used the insult "boob" far too often (boob meaning moron, not the body part).
Bekah and I enjoyed the film and both of us laughed at several points throughout (the mock-anime sequence mid-film makes the movie worth repeated viewings). The kids loved the movie; they watched it over a dozen times in the week following the first screening. And since the DVD had to be returned to Netflix, we went and bought our own copy for the kids's Easter basket.
Horton Hears a Who will be joining the ranks of our family favorites.
The story should be familiar to fans of the Dr. Seuss tale. Horton, an elephant (voiced by Carrey) that hears a cry of help from a tiny speck of dust, finds himself the protector of a microscopic planet that is home to the Whos. He befriends the Mayor of Whoville (Steve Carell) while creating foes of a grouchy kangaroo (Carol Burnett), bad Vlad (there is also a good Vlad that makes cookies), and a horde of malicious monkeys. Horton and the mayor are in the same boat. None of the other jungle animals believes Horton's speck is inhabited by tiny people - except a few kids who pretend to carry their own world on a flower (including one odd character who's world has a population of horses that "all eat rainbows, and poop butterflies"). No one in Whoville believes the mayor's warning that they are a speck of dust floating through space and that their world is in peril if a giant elephant can't guide them to safety.
The animation is not the best, but it maintains Seuss's imaginative style. There are several creative liberties within the film, but it stays true to the spirit of the book by using several of the most well known phrases through both dialog and narration (including the timeless "a person is a person, no matter how small"). And that one line is a great lesson for kids my son's age as well as kids my age. Sometimes it's nice to see Hollywood portray worthwhile values. Horton Hears a Who also encourages creative expression - my kids's specialty.
On the downside, there are several insults thrown around like monkeys flinging poop. (thankfully, the monkeys in the movie use bananas as ammunition rather than feces). While it's a worthy effort to teach younger kids that it's not nice to call people names, they used the insult "boob" far too often (boob meaning moron, not the body part).
Bekah and I enjoyed the film and both of us laughed at several points throughout (the mock-anime sequence mid-film makes the movie worth repeated viewings). The kids loved the movie; they watched it over a dozen times in the week following the first screening. And since the DVD had to be returned to Netflix, we went and bought our own copy for the kids's Easter basket.
Horton Hears a Who will be joining the ranks of our family favorites.
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