50/50

Directed by Jonathan Levine

Starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Seth Rogen, Bryce Dallas Howard, Anna Kendrick, Philip Baker Hall, Matt Frewer, and Anjelica Huston

Although I’m not in the habit of writing reviews about movies I’ve seen sober, this slow-burner has been in my thoughts since I saw it last night. As Martyn is out of town this week, precluding any possibility of a boozy review, I thought it both an appropriate substitute and a way for me to alleviate my preoccupation with it.

Adam Lerner (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is the poster boy for healthy, responsible lifestyle. He is a late-twentysomething, outdoorsy Seattle-dweller who works as a public radio producer, recycles, and abstains from even the most banal of vices, like jaywalking, caffeine, and alcohol. He is tolerant of his buffoonish best friend Kyle (Seth Rogen) and tidies up after his airheaded, pretentious artist girlfriend Rachel (Bryce Dallas Howard). He is, in so many words, the nicest guy on the planet and the last person who deserves to have anything bad happen to him.

So, naturally, he gets cancer. And not just any cancer; he gets Schwannoma neurofibrosarcoma, or as Kyle humorously simplifies to ingratiate himself with sympathetic SWFs: “he’s got stage four back cancer.” The kind you don’t want to have. The kind that has a 50% survival rate.

50/50 is branded as a comedy, but with such dark subject matter and an actor of Gordon-Levitt’s clout in the lead there’s an understanding you won’t be giggling the whole way through. In effect, that dichotomy ends up being the movie’s winning style.

With clever dialogue and actors capable of rising to the challenge the subject presents, the film has plenty of funny moments. None of the laughs are cheap or even implausible; they rely upon the actors’ sensitivity, timing, and Will Reiser’s incisive script – a blueprint drawn from his own cancer experiences. 50/50 also has a way of turning from comic to heart-rending on a dime, something that is rarely seen in mainstream fare and lifts this one above its ilk.

Sweetness, not melancholy, holds it all together

Because of the film’s lighter moments, usually involving Kyle’s ham-fisted attempts to console his friend (e.g. suggesting “I have cancer” as a pickup line) or Adam’s sweet-as-pie relationship with his trainee therapist Katherine (Anna Kendrick), the moments of bitter poignancy (of which there end up being quite a few) have infinitely more impact. Other cancer films like One True Thing, Love Story, or Autumn in New York are tedious and saturated with melodramatic sentimentality or, worse yet, use the disease as a plot device. They give themselves and the audience no breathing room.

Reiser and sophomore director Jonathan Levine (responsible for the similarly funny and touching The Wackness) are spot-on in their treatment of cancer and its impact on families. Many critics have argued that they don’t show you the worst of it, but do they really have to for the film to resonate? Gordon-Levitt is pitch-perfect in his passing through the stages of grief, subtly hinting that he may have resigned to his fate long before his family and friends abandon hope. Typically known for playing bolder, more direct women, Angelica Huston gives the small part of Adam’s mother a big impact with appropriate touches of anxiety, trepidation, frustration, and love. Kendrick plays to her strengths as cutely apprehensive, but the real show-stopper here is Seth Rogen.

By his own admission, Rogen is not a particularly strong or versatile actor. What he is, however, is absolutely effective. Not only in this movie but all of his movies. His charming, frequently goofy performances register well with audiences, he always leaves other actors the space they need and, as Kyle in this instance, so smartly uses his well-established humour as a defence mechanism, shielding himself against the ever-present fear of losing a loved one, a feeling that permeates the film with clever subtlety.

This is one of the most light-hearted cinematic endeavours about life-threatening illness and easily the best. It’s a rare, moving film never overplays its hand but also never pulls any punches. It rejects clichéd narrative ploys, embraces nuanced, organic performances, and involves viewers without cheap tricks. Most importantly, it is genuinely, adroitly redeeming. 50/50 should serve not only as a benchmark for cancer films, but for all films. 

The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn

Directed by Steven Spielberg
Starring Jamie Bell, Andy Serkis, Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Daniel Craig, and Snowy the Dog

It was an interesting gambit from the beginning: Steven Spielberg, who, with E.T. and the Indiana Jones trilogy, brought laughter and adventure and magic into the hearts of so many children (myself being one of them) now ran the risk of tarnishing so many precious childhood memories in similarly bold fashion. Not only was he adapting Tintin’s Adventures but some of his most popular and beloved stories, The Secret of the Unicorn saga.

Centred on the intrepid, titular journalist, The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn moves at a brisk pace from the purchase of an antique model galleon (named the Unicorn) in a quaint Belgian market to a globetrotting adventure featuring pirate treasure, motorcycle chases, opium traffickers, and throwing balled-up candy wrappers at the children in the row behind us. To be fair, they looked like punks and I had been, well, fucking drinking so I don’t really need any more of an excuse.  

There were a lot of bright colours and fast movement in this movie so it was sort of difficult for me to follow, but I remember the pacing and action sequences being pretty tight, particularly a kinetic 18^th Century-flashback swashbuckling sequence that is almost on par with some of the things Jean-Claude Van Damme has done. Perhaps not the early-mid-90s, Golden Era Van Damme but Spielberg here certainly rivals Maximum Risk or something.

Great makeup artists know no bounds

The dedication of actors to their roles in this film is second to none. Particularly impressive is Nick Frost as Thomson. This guy grew a moustache and must have dropped at least 100 lbs. for the part. And whoever did the makeup for this gig also deserves mad respect; getting Frost and Simon Pegg (who plays the identical Thompson) to look alike is no small feat. They both must have had to dye their moustaches and spend hours in the makeup trailer before each shoot.

I feel the real standout, however, is the canine actor who plays Snowy. Holy shit. Best. Dog. EVER. No horseradish, this dog is doing stunts that put Jackie Chan to shame. I mean this little guy jumps out a window, onto a truck, leaps onto an adjacent fire engine, across the rooftop later, and finally onto the baddies’ car without any Kung Fu training or even opposable digits! I must have spent about half the movie commenting “Jesus fuck this dog is just owning all these people so hard!” before being shushed by the late-twentysomething androgyne sitting next to me. I quickly accused him of hating dogs and looking like a Filipino Gary Busey and he left the theatre in sobs. Maybe a bit harsh but I still stand firmly by both declarations.

This dog is such a badass he needs to be held back

One element I was sore about was Spielberg and Andy Serkis’ decision to make Captain Haddock Scottish. He is the only character in the Tintin stories whose ancestry is discussed, but nowhere in the books is his ethnicity or nationality suggested. It is in fact one of the most hotly contested subjects of debate on Tintin forums worldwide, perhaps second only to the issue of Tintin’s sexuality (for the record I think he’s straight but experimented in college). Although they could have given the character an ambiguous accent or made him a Sloanie like the rest of the characters in the film, the executive decision to Scotify™ (FIRST!) him is upsetting for three reasons:

1. They are adapting, not generating, material and therefore have no right;

2. Any part in a movie requiring a Scottish actor should be offered to Sean Connery;

3. I’m racist and I hate Scots.

  

The one thing they did nail with Haddock was the hard drinking. One of the best representations I’ve seen of substance abuse in a PG environment since the Cookie Monster or those Hobbits in Lord of the Rings. It was such a rewarding Boozy Wednesday experience I turned to my friend Martyn and uttered: “Impromptu drinking game! When Haddock drinks we drink!” but soon realised that this was a terrible idea that might end up with the Captain projectile vomiting towards the audience in 3D causing me to projectile vomit back at him. I know that sounds awesome in theory but I just wasn’t up for it, nor were the three rows of people in front of me.

What I am up for is sequels. I just can’t wait for Spielberg to adapt The Black Island so we get to see Tintin fight that huge angry gorilla. I think in 3D its fur would look so vivid and lifelike that I would have no problem paying £3.50 FOR A PAIR OF GOGGLES EVERY TIME.

Steven: if you’re reading this, I need you to understand that your people will never pay an extra £3.50 for cheap plastic goggles. We’ll just go see a Sacha Baron Cohen movie instead. I know you made Schindler and Munich for us – and hey, word to your mother for that – but you’re alienating us now and it’s not cool. The only reason I made it in is because I haggled the ticket usher down to £1.25 and a handful of popcorn.

Damage: 5/10 (I was gonna write ‘4’ but then I realised I couldn’t clearly remember what I drank so I reckon it was probably a ‘5’ night; there was 6 oz of Glenlivet 15 yo French Oak Reserve in there somewhere)

Boozy rating: 7/10 (with plenty of action and built-in drinking games it earns solid points, but not nearly enough graphic violence and there was this bit in the desert that was way too bright man)

P.S. Whoever is reading my blog in Russia and Brazil big up yourselves. There are only a few things on this planet capable of making my ego any bigger and having readers on four continents: definitely one of them things.

Drive

Directed by Nicolas Winding Refn

Starring Ryan Gosling, Carey Mulligan, Bryan Cranston, Ron Perlman, Christina Hendricks, Oscar Isaac, and Albert Brooks

It’s difficult not to have massively built-up expectations of this film, which by virtue of its international acclaim and grand showing at Cannes this year had promised to either be a cinematic triumph or a massive letdown.

At the end of the movie I thought the former and Martyn the latter. I left the house thinking we’d simply get boozy, watch Ryan Gosling brutalise a few people and do some fancy driving, have a nightcap, and call it an evening. Instead I was treated to an hour-long drunken tirade about what bollocks the movie was and a midnight footnote resembling: “I hope you write a balanced review.”

Because I am a gracious person and a conscientious friend, I am going to write this chronicle in call-and-answer format. In plain writing will be my thoughts about the movie and what I appreciated in it and in bold what I imagine Martyn would have to say about this being the shittiest film we’ve seen yet and why everyone involved in the production must die.

Nameless young Driver (Ryan Gosling) is a wayfaring stranger and strict adherent to voluntary simplicity working as a mechanic, stuntman, and moonlighting as a getaway driver for whoever pays the piper and plays by his rules. His fatal flaw is a soft spot he develops for neighbour Liz (Carey Mulligan) and her son Benicio (Kaden Leos). They become his link to the world and a chance at redemption, even though he would never ask for it outright.  When Liz’s ne’er-done-good husband Standard (Oscar Isaac) is released from jail, money-hungry thugs inevitably come calling and the Driver’s attachment to the family gets him in deeper than he expected.

The only thing deeper than expected in this movie was the stage of sleep I fell into.

In terms of genre, tone, and style, Drive had me from the word “go.” Director Nicolas Winding Refn stays true to his neo-noir influences, painting a bleak portrait of a shady and unforgiving Los Angeles. A cliché in itself, granted: gritty realism is the name of the game here, and Refn has it down pat. Film-noir has never been a world megalomaniac villains, superhuman ass-kickers, or black-and-white morality and loyalties. It is about a hapless player unable to insulate himself from disaster. It is about survival of the fittest in a world that punishes error swiftly and brutally. When your back is against the wall morality goes right out the window. This sense of helplessness is conveyed perfectly not only in the Driver’s quiet and violent determination but also in Albert Brooks’ against-type crime boss Bernie Rose, a villain who is fearsome and lethal by necessity, not by choice or out of sadism.

Oh please! Only an American could have made this movie. It tries so hard to be European – whatever the fuck that means anymore – but fails miserably. The most European thing about it was that there were pizzas in a scene or two. The sparse dialogue and dark shots of Los Angeles are meant to telegraph some sort of depth but frankly I’ve been in deeper swimming pools. Film-noir? More like film-shit.

As an avowed fan of the lone gunman mystique, Ryan Gosling roped me in as the stoic, mysterious, steely-eyed anti-hero, joining the ranks of Alain Delon’s Samourai, George Clooney’s American, and Forest Whitaker’s Ghost Dog in an immutable canon of strong, silent, deadly protagonists. He is a sly actor with a profound understanding of the genre and he walks the line between protector and destroyer in flawless, compelling form.

Gosling: Moody when he should have been nudie

Christ on a bike! That wasn’t acting. He smirks and grunts his way through this movie and he doesn’t even get his cock out! If this were actually a European movie, from France or Denmark or something, he would have gotten his cock out. I cannot believe I paid 12 quid to see Ryan Gosling wearing a fucking scorpion jacket for two hours.

Refn’s sparing, tactical use of action, sound, and violence is nothing short of masterful. For a crime thriller, the first hour of Drive is remarkably uneventful, although not without purpose. Ever so carefully, Refn builds and aura of menace an impending catastrophe, a powder keg of nefarious alliances and blood money threatening to explode at any minute. The tension in this movie is drawn out like a tightrope and Refn milks it by dropping long periods of ominous silence in the middle of Drive’s heist scenes, making palpable the trepidation of the characters involved.

Not a single good car chase in the whole bloody movie! They should have called it Parked. I have never before in my life fallen asleep in a movie and I nodded off completely in the first 10 minutes of this one, during that whole opening “car chase” scene.

You were drunk.

I wasn’t! I wasn’t even tired. As an action movie this blows more pole than Liam Fox in a room full of Scottish underclassmen. You’re a cowbag.

Stop. Hammertime.

While the movie is shockingly brutal, it is so in short jabs, just enough to allow the audience to understand the lengths to which the Driver and his nemeses are willing to go, and a disturbing reminder of the darkness that lies in all of them. As with all great storytelling, the threat of violence proves infinitely more effective and nerve-wracking than its overuse.

The violence didn’t work at all. What, I’m supposed to be impressed because Ryan stomps on a few people and gets his face covered in blood? Limp-wristed at best. It was as satisfying as watching a Hasidic porno.

To be fair, the music in this film was fucking awful.

So. Fucking. Awwwful.

Damage: 3/10 (Pre-movie: 1 pint Guinness, 1 measure Bowmore 15yo; During: 4 x 250 ml Grolsch)

Boozy Rating: 6/10 (A fantastic movie but there’s really no added value in seeing it drunk)

The Three Musketeers

Directed by Paul W.S. Anderson

Starring Logan Lerman, Matthew MacFadyen, Ray Stevenson, Luke Evans, Mads Mikkelsen, Christoph Waltz, Milla Jovovich, Juno Temple, Freedie Fox, and Orlando Bloom.

After last week’s dose of seriousness, it was time to get back on the debauchery track with guest movieboozer Becky.

Those of you who know me also know that I have a staunch “no chicks” policy when it comes to boozy Wednesday. This goes back to late last year when my hoss James and I decided to bring our respective dates to boozy Tuesday (as it was known at the time) and it was like they needed to have the rules explained to them. The two were essentially competing to have the highest profile with their outdoor-voice jibber-jabber. In all my years of movie drinking I have never once been thrown out of a theatre and bringing broads on a boozy Tuesday excursion nearly brought the streak to a bitter end. Everyone loves a drunk, but no one loves a loud, obnoxious one.

Wednesdays: 1; Broads: 0

It was meant to be a sober night, but The Three Musketeers was the only film playing at an appropriate hour and there was no way I was sitting through that piece of shit cold sober. The decision turned out to be a good one, with that movie now joining my ever-expanding “Things one mustn’t do sober” list along with swimming, trans-Atlantic flights, and donating blood (it doubles the drunk instantly and it’s FREE!!).

A reboot of Alexandre Dumas’ swashbuckling classic, The Three Musketeers revolves around a 17^th century trio of King Louis’ guard who refuse to throw down arms after their regiment is disbanded. They choose instead to become outlaws and antagonise the power-hungry Caridnal Richilieu as he tries to expand his influence and seize France’s reins.

1993: Fencing

2011: Winning

Several adaptations of the film have been made and this one had me wishing for the good old days when Kiefer and Charlie Sheen ruined people’s shit. Let me repeat that: this made me wish I were at a Disney movie with Charlie Sheen in it. To his credit, the guy has fucking Tiger Blood ™ and porked Denise Richards for a good coupla years but a heroic French swordsman he is not. You know your day is done when Ashton Kutcher is filling your shoes (and getting stronger ratings). The good news is he’s probably so coked out of his mind he thinks he’s being Punk’d and he’ll return to set soon enough.

Come hither, Fräulein

All digressions aside, however, this is probably the silliest, most absurd movies ever made in terms of historical shenanigans, ham-fisted dialogue, tedious rivalries, and its multiple distortions of the laws of physics. For serious, if Albert Einstein had been sitting in the back row at this movie I would have gone over to give him a huge hug and tried to feed him consolation beer, both because The Three Musketeers single-handedly undoes the progress humankind has made in the last century and the prospect of seeing Einstein ripped, heckling North London girls and asking if they’d like to take a ride on his lip-ferret is probably the funniest thing I would ever see. I swear, I would die happy.



Instead of exclusively rocking the Hatorade™ on this movie and acting all clever in my derision of it (as critics do), I’m going to praise its drunken value. Milla Jovovich made enough appearances to keep DrunkBen happy, Orlando Bloom is fun to throw popcorn at, you can guffaw at ANY MOMENT during this movie (believe me you’ll want to) and it won’t be objectionable, and the actors who play King Louis and d’Artagnan in this movie are such a laughable little bitches that you’ll feel warm and secure in your manhood by the end credits. For serious, King Louis’ most pressing concern throughout the entire film is what colour to wear.

Any gayer and he'd be a picnic basket

I must again caution you against seeing this movie sober; the results could be catastrophic. During one of the action set-pieces (none of which are eventful, somehow) I heard some hella loud gunfire behind me and thought “Nice! The fucking surround sound is kicking in! This movie is awesome!” But as it turns out some poor bastard four rows behind me had nothing to drink and decided to eat a bullet, exit stage left Hemingway-style. Mad props to him for holding out as long as he did. Thrust into the same position I would have bought 37 boxes of Junior Mints and committed Type II Diabetes suicide or asked an overweight person in the cinema to sit on my chest until I died of positional asphyxiation.

The movie is long so bring lots of beer with you and maybe a catheter. Becky and I had great laughs during the first few acts until she passed out cold in her seat around the 74^th minute, awoke on the 92^nd and spent the rest of the flick in the ladies’ room. So the “no chicks” rule is back on, sisters. Maybe I’ll consider some applications next year.

Damage: 4/10 (Pre-movie: 3 measures Glenkinchie 12yo; During: 2 x 500 ml Heineken)

Boozy rating: 8/10 (Don't get me wrong, it's a shit film but an absolute boozy guilty pleasure)

Next week: Drive 

Crazy, Stupid, Love.

Directed by Glenn Ficarra and John Requa
Starring Steve Carell, Julianne Moore, Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, Marisa Tomei, Analeigh Tipton, John Carroll Lynch, Josh Groban, and Kevin Bacon

Change of pace this week: it’s going to be a serious review.

To be frank, I was expecting a regular old boozy Wednesday dotted with episodes of Martyn collapsing drunk over rows of unsuspecting moviegoers and me forgetting where I lived and asking the guy at the Kebab shop if he could provide directions to “please which way is me home? I… home? Ben?”

Instead we ended up remaining relatively sober and seeing a terrific movie. Never too late to teach an old dog new tricks, I guess.

Crazy, Stupid, Love is a simple tale, some may call it worn, but rendered in a way that is sweet, contemporary, unpretentious, and heart-warming. A brilliant opening scene shows us Cal (Steve Carell) and Emily (Julianne Moore) at the tail end of a 25-year marriage, surrounded by youthful romance and bankrupt of their own. Within a two minutes of the WB Production logo leaving the screen, Emily is confessing her extra-marital dalliances and asking for a divorce. Cold as ice, right? I had just cracked open my first Peroni. This woman, clearly, was not a time-waster.

Carell: learning the tricks of the trade

The rest of the movie evolves out of Cal’s ensuing tailspin, which lands him devastated in a nouveau-riche California lounge bar observing modern-day Don Juan Jacob (Ryan Gosling) working his magic on any woman around and getting pick of the litter night after night. Jacob, as it turns out, has also noted Cal’s sad-sack antics and, for nebulous reasons of his own, offers to take the new bachelor under his wing.

Married in his late teens, Cal has never had to think twice about dating and sex appeal. Now thrust back onto the market by the slickest womanizer this side of the Sierra Madre, Cal proves to be quick study and more of a catch than he thought possible. 

Unfairly pigeonholed as a supporting or TV actor, Carell here reminds us just how lovely he is as a leading man, and how strong yet subtle a performance he can give in the hands of the right screenplay and director. He never goes over the top with his comedy or his portrayal of a man in total emotional disarray. An early scene where he drives young babysitter Jessica (Analeigh Tipton) home having just split from his wife is spectacular in terms of how much weight Carell can deliver when only saying a few words (and being filmed over-the-shoulder, no less).

Carell and Moore: effortless chemistry

Although Cal becomes an able lady-killer in his own right, the movie is, at its core, about the pursuit of romantic love and turns people take on the road to it. It's about him finding his way back home.

Crazy, Stupid, Love takes viewers completely by surprise and separates itself from other like-genre movies in a number of ways. For starters: it is a film without villains. None of these people have set out to harm others; even Kevin Bacon’s homewrecking accountant David Lindhogen is somewhat pitiable in his cuckolding of Cal. Even though the movie is unabashed in its love-conquers-all paradigm, it acknowledges the complications of relationships in a modern world, even when none of the parties involved are malicious in the slightest.

The film is also a rare character-driven rom-com, as opposed to plot existing merely as a vehicle for coupling some eight-figure salary movie stars and dropping lame humour like breadcrumbs along the way. Even Jacob – whose appearances are brief and could have been mishandled by a lesser actor – is three-dimensional and sufficiently tragic in his opulence and solitary malaise that the audience invests in his character too.

Gosling and his winning smile

2011 is Ryan Gosling’s year and he is, yet again, a triumph in this film. A testament to his versatility and onscreen charisma, he is as effective, credible, and human as a trust-fund lounge lizard in light romantic-comedy as he is in heavier fare like Drive or Half Nelson. Even more commendable is his enduring sex-symbol status, since he’s one of the few celebrities who have properly earned it. Unlike Brad Pitt or Hugh Jackman (who, let’s face it, were just born pretty and aged gracefully), Gosling has a young puppydog face (a bit lopsided, even), is not formidably tall or broad, and doesn’t possess strong distinguishing features. What he does have is attitude. He has singular control over his image, his physical presence on camera, and can exude sex appeal on command. As Lars (of Lars and the Real Girl), he is utterly convincing as a completely repressed and introverted small-towner, whereas this latest incarnation of a 21^st century lothario looks sexy eating a slice of takeout pizza. He is seriously one of the great actors of his generation.

While not groundbreaking, Crazy, Stupid, Love is funny and brilliantly acted and fearlessly optimistic. You can’t help but love it.

Next week: The Three Musketeers

Friends With Benefits

Directed by Will Gluck

Starring Justin Timberlake, Mila Kunis, Patricia Clarkson, Woody Harrelson, Jenna Elfman, and Richard Jenkins

I feel like this is the second time this flick has been made in the last 12 months. There was that No Strings Attached silliness earlier this year, wherein a small, clever, feisty brunette (Natalie Portman) and a tall, dark, handsome, driven professional (Ashton Kutcher) start bumping their junk together under the guise of platonic fluid exchanges devoid of the entanglements and emotional investment that relationships entail. The punchline: they get entangled. What a curveball. Watching these people write movie scripts is like watching George W. Bush play Simon™ on medium difficulty; it’s strong and unsettling evidence that we’re really not so far removed from monkeys and apes and stuff.

Friends With Benefits (down to its title) is a lather, rinse, repeat affair starring Mila Kunis and Justin Timberlake as the titular junk-bumping friends, and while I’ll readily acknowledge a posteriori that the movie itself is limp-wristed, my intentions in seeing it were absolutely, 100% legit. Because I keeps it real like that.

"I just need better pattern recognification!"

Before I get into the bulk of the review, here’s the scoop for all you haters: Justin Timberlake is basically one of the hardest, iciest motherfuckers alive (perhaps second only to Vin Diesel, who admits to playing Dungeons & Dragons and is still somehow hard as fuck). Here’s what I’m talking about. Do you remember when Britney Spears was young? And I’m not talking about the In the Zone, 55-hour marriage young Britney; I’m talking about Fresh Outta High School, Barely Legal Britney. Like back when she wasn’t old enough to sign any legal documents by herself and her parents tossed a coin to see if they were going to throw her into a porno or a music video. Yeah, that young Britney.

Let me tell you: no one who was in high school when her career exploded will ever forget. I was, like, 15 and this girl came out of nowhere and ousted Madonna from my spank bank. All the world’s cameras were suddenly pointed at her as she put on the sexy-but-principled schoolgirl act and claimed she was saving herself for marriage. Naturally, all the other 15-year-old guys at my high school, flush with Maxim subscriptions, steeped in teenage machismo, walking around with their collars popped would say: “Marriage, eh? We’ll see about that.”

And then, before any of us had graduated (or even finished the 10^th grade), Justin Timberlake came along like: “No. Seriously guys. We’ll fucking see about that.”

Better still, once he was done deflowering her, he waited roughly five minutes before calling his publicist and saying: “I want you to get all the liberal Jewish media on the phone and tell them that I did the following things to Britney: T-square, the piledriver, the shocker, the Danza slap, Cincinnati bowtie, Angry Dragon. And then I made her lie in the wet spot.” Since then Britney made Crossroads and married K-Fed and Oscar-nominated directors line up to work with JT. Game, set, match.

If that evidence wasn’t compelling enough: remember when he was dating Jessica Biel? It was when he was touring futuresex/lovesounds and she was all up in his Kool-Aid like: “Hey Justin! Why don’t I come along on tour with you and do the girlfriend thing?! It’ll be great! We’ll have sooooo much fun together! LOL!”

Just imagine being JT and your daily routine being:

1)      Wake up 4 p.m.

2)      Pizza

3)      Play 11,000-person stadium

4)      Have Jess lick the sweat off my body until I am dry

5)      Jack Daniels single barrel

6)      Amphetamines

7)      Mario Kart

8)      Pizza

9)      Sleep

Just look! You could lie down and take a nap on those!

This is Jessica Biel we’re talking about. She has lips like my sofa. And instead of going for it JT told her: “Thanks but I gotta do my own thing right now. And by do my own thing I mean collect venereal diseases.”

 

ICIEST COLDEST MOTHERFUCKER ALIVE

The problem with Friends With Benefits is the same problem that most romantic comedies have: it lacks depth and imagination. It’s a movie that throws no curveballs (I was being sarcastic earlier). Frankly, it’s getting insulting that Hollywood producers feel they can bank repeatedly on solid chemistry and winsome good looks the two leads and people will take the film seriously enough to give it three stars. As soon as the rom-coms of the nineties became tiresome and listless we started seeing more R-rated permutations in cinemas, some of which (like The 40-Year-Old Virgin) were even sublime pictures. Now, six years later, screenwriters and directors have even become complacent in their irreverence, assuming that sexual boldness and a few filthy one-liners are suitable replacement for plot or dialogue or a decent finale.

It’s a particular shame in this case, since this movie has a lot going for it. Woody Harrelson has cemented himself as one of the most likeable onscreen presences and he makes the most of a small role here as JT’s older, wiser gay sidekick. A few other screen veterans make strong appearances, with Patricia Clarkson earning big laughs as Mila Kunis’ wayward, alcoholic mother and Richard Jenkins (surely one of the most underappreciated actors in Hollywood) as JT’s disabled father. Although contrived, there is a charming, touching father/son moment near the end of the movie that makes you wish everyone on board had tried just a little bit harder with Friends With Benefits.

But they didn’t so the movie goes nowhere. Just like my evening went nowhere. I had one lousy beer during this movie and I spilled maybe a quarter of it on the guy next to me. Sorry if I ruined your jeans or your date dude. If it means anything you took it like a champ.

Damage: 2/10 (A couple beers at home pre-movie, 1 x 750 Stella Artois during)

Boozy rating: 2/10 (Martyn kept glaring at me during the flick and will never let me off the hook. From now on, every time I select a good movie he’ll hang this over my head. “Well Mr. L, seems you’ve redeemed yourself a little from last time, n’est-ce pas?” Fucker.)

Next week: Crazy stupid love

SUPER

Written and directed by James Gunn

Starring Rainn Wilson, Ellen Page, Liv Tyler, Kevin Bacon, and Nathan Fillion

*** WARNING: MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD ***

It’s no secret: superhero movies are running out of steam. It was all very exciting to see Sam Raimi’s Spider-man in theatres back in 2002, as graphic imaging technology had progressed to a point where our most beloved masked do-gooders and their heroic tales could finally be given the grandiose scale they deserved.

Ten years later, however, we find film studios scraping the bottom of the barrel with high-budget, low-brow ignominies like The Green Lantern, Iron Man 2, and Thor; the kind of pictures that even a belly full of alcohol couldn’t save. To their credit, the banality of superhero-ness (how oxymoronic, no?) has elicited a response from a small group of thoughtful, indie filmmakers who are spearheading a counter-trend: heroes without powers.

Toronto: national leaders in higher education and taking a kicking

Sure, there are the sleek, big studio pictures like Batman Begins or Watchmen – wherein the heroes may not be superhuman but can still open up a can of Zidane on baddies as required – but let’s not forget Special and Defendor, films that feature protagonists who are delusional, out of shape, and retarded. I’m not kidding folks and that’s not a figure of speech; they sincerely made a movie about a differently-abled superhero and everyone needs to watch it. It’s also filmed in Toronto, so all the retards there will recognize their city and their retardation. Go Leafs!

Super, which plants itself firmly in the latter category, is the chronicle of the Frank D’Arbo/Crimson Bolt (Rainn Wilson) and his crime-fighting exploits. A short order chef whose recovering drug-addict wife Sarah (Liv Tyler) runs off with seedy strip-club owner Jacques (Kevin Bacon), Frank sets into a deep depression in the early stages of the film. Now, I don’t remember this next part of the movie because I’d been drinking but Wikipedia told me it happened and I believe everything I read on Wikipedia: Frank (like recent divorcées do, I guess) watches a lot of daytime TV and gets caught up in a public access superhero saga on the All-Jesus Network. The Holy Avenger (Nathan Fillion) soon transcends the television screen and appears to Frank in a vision, convincing him that his purpose is to fight crime.

If you haven't considered Evangelism, now's the time to start

Okay folks, I fully realize that all of my reviews thus far have been of films that involve reprisal or vigilante-ism but I can assure you that it’s neither intentional nor a cause for concern because all of them are comedies (except for La piel que habito, which is not a comedy so much as concrete evidence that Jesus died in vain). You could argue that any film you watch while drunk is a comedy, but let’s face it: you need to have a pretty good sense of humour to cast Rainn Wilson as a superhero and Kevin Bacon as the drug-baron arch-nemesis.

Of course, it’s tricky for me to see a sparsely attended movie like this one and not end up feeling self-conscious. As I’ve mentioned in a past column, Martyn has a propensity for mid-movie restroom absences and from now on he’s getting the aisle seat every time because this guy knocks over bottles like they’re bowling pins. It’s like he’s doing it on purpose. When you’re in an independent film at a nice cinema in Central London with about 11 other people in the screening and four or six bottles go clanking across the concrete floor it becomes pretty clear pretty quickly who the alckies are. I almost felt compelled to stand up and recite the mission statement from my blog as an explanation but decided against it because I couldn’t remember it verbatim nor access it on my smartphone due to a lack of cell reception, and also because I was probably too drunk to read. Perhaps in future small screenings I’ll read it pre-picture as a disclaimer of sorts. Surely that’ll go over well.

As if Martyn’s glass parade wasn’t enough, at a later point in the film when one of the main characters bites it in a way that is shocking, brutally violent, and patently un-funny I was about five Peronis deep and started guffawing for a profoundly ill-advised length of time and at an absurd volume. Think Nicolas Cage after a director has just told him he has artistic carte-blanche. It was so uncomfortable and just plain psychotic that about 75% of the theatre started giggling 5-10 seconds later because I couldn’t compose myself. I imagined it being like Mel Gibson watching Schindler’s List. Although I’m sure no laughter would have followed his.

Too young to be hot or too hot to be young?

The Crimson Bolt later goes on to pick up a sidekick, Boltie (Ellen Page), and Ellen Page in movies is always risky. Sure, the girl is only two years younger than me, but no matter how old she gets she still looks 16 or 17. You say to yourself, “Yeah, she’s cute, and it’s okay for me to ogle her because she’s 24 and probably not much smaller than Jennifer Love-Hewitt, who was sort of a big deal back in the nineties and has boobs that I’d love to motorboat.” But then there’s a rape scene in this movie and you’re like, “Nah, man, I was wrong and I’m waaay not drunk enough for this.” Still, as far as rape scenes go it’s more cringe-inducing than shocking or offensive. You’d have to see it to get it, though, folks.

Looking back, this review has been fairly serious (or at least compared to my others). The reason for this is I’m actually quite serious about this movie. It was a fun boozy night out and the film, at its heights, is pretty fucking mental, but also unexpectedly touching and artful in its rendering of a down-on-his-luck, unhinged anti-hero. It’s hysterically funny drunk or sober, performances are strong across the board, and it achieves its artistic and atmospheric ambitions more successfully than nearly any other superhero movie you’ll see, albeit unconventionally.

Oh, and in case it wasn’t clear before: I hate Toronto and I hope it gets consumed by a plague of locusts.

Damage: 5/10 (pre-movie: ½ pint Taddy Lager, 5 measures of Sam Smith pub whiskey; during the movie: 5 x 330 ml Peroni bottles)

Boozy rating: 9/10 (Martyn and I both had a good time despite the fact the we could have drawn less unwanted attention by firing off a signal flare)

La piel que habito

Written and directed by Pedro Almodóvar 

Starring Antonio Banderas, Elena Anaya, Marisa Paredes, and Jan Cornet

Alright folks, Martyn and I seriously took one for the team this time around. Not only did my urine come out brown and cloudy this morning (looking much like unfiltered apple cider) but this movie was worse than most things. Many people may take this with a grain of salt, since my modus operandi for film reviews consists of drinking heavily and seeing mediocre action flicks, but I know my art film and I’ve seen Mulholland Drive and understood it so when I say this movie was not merely worse than most movies but most THINGS, you had better believe it suckers.

Here are some things I’d rather do than watch La piel que habito:

• Get kicked in the junk (perhaps not with cleats or boots but a shoeless foot or a pair of casual shoes or trainers would be acceptable)
• Sit in traffic for two hours
• Shave a really hairy guy’s back
• Witness a robbery or two hookers fighting in the street and spend the whole day in a police station giving a deposition
• Have my back shaved by a really hairy guy



It came out like this, for reals

• Have someone step on my blue suede shoes

For serious people, this movie made me wish that I had one of those red flashing Batphones that I could use upon my return home, only instead of linking me up to Commissioner Gordon it would go straight to Hisashi Owada’s office at the International Court of Justice.

Me: Yo Shishi, what’s the good word brother?

Hisashi Owada: Yeah, yeah, you know, same as ever. Breakin teeth, breakin hearts. This geezer Goran Hadžić was here the other week, getting all up in my grill talking all kinds of smack so I had to set him right, you know, gave him a good coupla slaps so he know Daddy Owady don’t play no shit.

Me: Yea, that’s straight-up yakuza. You gonna give him the chair?

Hisashi Owada: Fucking-A right I’m giving him the chair! The hammer’s gon’ fall on all those death-dealing Serbo roundeyes. Daddy don’t sleep till alla dem is hangin from the business end of a rope, son.

Me: Word.

Hisashi Owada: So what’s the skinny, B-money? I’m kinda busy here you know. Slow justice is no justice.

Me: Dude I need you to look into Pedro Almodóvar for me.

Hisashi Owada: What for?

Me: Crimes against humanity.

Hisashi Owada: For Skin?

Me: 2 right, 2 right.

Hisashi Owada: Yeah, no surprise there. Connery called earlier saying the same damn thing. I’ll make sure the charges stick.

Me: Nice. Big up yourself, brother. Tell your daughter I said what’s up.

Daddy Owady finds your lack of faith disturbing

Only I have no Batphone so instead of that I went home and passed out cold after dry-heaving for a few minutes. Martyn later reported falling asleep on the tube, waking up in Morden, and taking a night bus home at stupid o’clock. Fair to say we paid our share to bring you this review, so you had better read it.

Right, the movie. The audience is essentially parachuted into the middle of an ongoing narrative, with critical plot points unveiled gradually as the film lumbers forward. Robert Ledgard (Antonio Banderas) is a prominent surgeon and geneticist who, by conducting clandestine experiments on a beautiful young patient imprisoned in his house (Elena Anaya), has developed completely flame-resistant skin that looks and feels natural. The announcement of his discovery to the scientific community generates a lot of chatter but it may be tricky for him to reveal his results since his only test subject is a hostage in a spandex bodysuit. When Ledgard’s estranged half-brother later shows up to his house dressed like a fat tiger (see the trailer if you don’t believe me!), discovers the girl, and decides to get his rape on, the mess just gets messier.

La piel que habito treads conventional Almodóvar ground, exploring isolation, sexual identity, the significance of blood ties, and by “exploring” I mean he beats you over the head with them until the banging ceases to make sense. These are things everyone has surely thought over at some point, but the narrative and characters are so bat-shit crazy and far-removed from reality that their world becomes a grotesquely indulgent exaggeration of emotions otherwise worth exploring. Even if you manage to overlook the film’s unabashedly and gratuitously lurid turns, it is one of the most manipulative things you’ll ever watch. I must have watched half of this movie with my jaw agape in wonder at how useless and psychotic it becomes, but I still wouldn’t go so far as to say it has “shock value” because to attribute any kind of value to Skin would be heresy.

Nice car ruined

Halfway through the longest two hours of my life and desperate, I tried pummeling through a 6 oz. hip flask of 86-proof Dalwhinnie 15yo. I was incorrect in my assumption that it would make the film easier to digest or forget; I remember every miserable moment of it and getting liquored up only made me wish incessantly that Antonio Banderas would get into a wicked car chase in this pimpin’ BMW M6 with 18” mags he rolls around in but he only ends up driving that thing in an out of his driveway. The only car chase-ish scene (and I say “ish” because Almodóvar directs a car chase like Kubrick directs space travel, YAAAAWWWN) sees Banderas driving a panel van and that’s just a huge waste of time, action/adventure star power, and built-up anticipation. The booze also makes you want to ogle the sublime Elena Anaya, who is paraded shamelessly around the screen nude or in skin-tight outfits for the entire movie, only Almodóvar throws a plot twist halfway into the film that makes you not want to ogle her anymore. Not only can he ruin your evening, this cat can also ruin a hot girl for life, which adds teasing to his ever-expanding list of tricks alongside self-indulgence and pretension.

Nice girl ruined

Sure, you could turn around and say “you’re a fine one to talk, this whole blog is self-indulgent” (which it is) but I’m still right and this movie is still bull’s pizzle and Hisashi Owada is still getting a call from me as soon as I can find his phone number or locate him on Facebook. Because yeah, I was totally kidding before. We’re totally not friends. Yet.

Damage: 8/10 (pre-movie: one measure Talisker 10yo, ½ bottle Cava Brut; during movie: 2 x 500 ml cans of Kronenbourg 1664, 6 oz Dalwhinnie 15yo; post-movie: one measure Talisker)

Boozy rating: 1/10 (the movie made me want to never drink again more than the drinking did)

Next week: Cowboys and Aliens (for real this time)