Get Smart/The Love Guru

Something Old/Something New; Something Borrowed/Something Lewd

When you think about it, Steve Carell only has two levels: absolutely real and Absolut Psycho. In what was arguably the pinnacle of the Frat Pack movies, Anchorman, Carell's comedic style minted gold as a zealous court jester in a lackadaisical circus, and he stole every scene he was in; in Dan in Real Life he flexed his creepy-strong performance muscles¹ as romantic foil to Juliette Binoche, who is a real actor. But much like his slightly more famous and blander companion, Will Ferrell, the middle ground is where things tend to get rocky. This vague medium of comedy-within-reason does not suit either gentleman. It is in this grey area where jokes yield stunted, half-baked chuckles where fertile, rich laughter should have been. You go in expecting a kid-friendly 40 Year-Old Virgin, which is a tad unreasonable, but you're done a far deeper injustice because you get Evan Almighty. So it's with disappointment and chagrin and, yes, a little reluctance that I deem Get Smart an inappropriate choice for Carell to make. This sort of buffoonery is pat and benign - I like Steve when he's sharp, coy, disaffected and burning below the surface². I also was a huge fan of the original series as a kid, and I don't like to see deliciously dated acts updated for broader modern appeal³. Couple that disillusionment with a puzzling, mixed cast and writing credits whose best work not only includes but is limited to Failure to Launch, I suspect this "action comedy" might have the same effect on its audiences as a Cone of Silence.

Yet somehow, I don't think Carell has to worry about losing his edge anytime soon (a couple sports-oriented farces couldn't kill his predecessor, and Carell still has years before that kind of hubris could strike him). Hollywood might be a-buzz over the potential the conflict of comedic titans and the disastrous effects of demographic overlap, but I wouldn't let that fluster me if I were Carell, because I do not think of Mike Myers as competition.

Myers has had the unique ability to translate SNL skits into feature films, with generally positive if uneven results. He has in common with Ben Stiller a sort of paradoxical rebelliousness (see Austin Powers; Zoolander) coupled with a sellable soul (see Shrek; any of Stiller's rom coms), which has earned him a slot as an auteur. But when Jim Carrey did The Grinch and Myers did Cat in the Hat, it kind of felt like being in one of those debates over who is hotter, MJ or Prince? We already kind of knew, even before the artificially whitened skin started creeping us out. So whereas Get Smart might suffer from too many kooks at one typewriter, Mike Myers has been hitting the same set of keys for so long that he should have written twenty Hamlets by now. With a banshee-like persistence his attention-seeking caricature has summoned the death knell⁴ and, if we're lucky, its relative failure will signal the end of this brand of comedy and we can all cheerfully forget the discomfort of this summer⁵.

What cracks me up is that, in the end, he still gets away with wearing a fat suit - although it admittedly does a poor job of augmenting anything other than his nose.

1. Just like a friend's dad who wears those drab polo T-shirts that one day seem to hug his chest a little tighter than you remember, in just the oh-so-right (and oh-so-wrong) ways.

2. Proust scholars are notoriously angsty.

3. Unless, of course, we're talking about Speed Racer. Bastardize that franchise to high heaven!

4. Jessica Alba, a.k.a. the kiss of cinematic death (for the love of God, don't see: Fantastic Four, Good Luck Chuck).

5. I'm talking to you, Sandler. You owe me.

The Happening

Or, What M. Night's Career Isn't.

Don't bother. Admit it, even you know this movie sucks, and you haven't seen it, either. Why do I know this for sure? Two reasons.

Reason #1: Mark Wahlberg.

Face the (gasp!) facts: Marky Mark isn't bankable. He hasn't done a single decent movie since I Heart Huckabees. A leave of absence in Hollywood is easily forgiven, especially if you have a creative excuse and your return is sudden and spectacular (i.e., Robert Downey Jr.). But when you go a presidential term without any notable credits despite constantly working,¹ and gradually fading into a haze of dislikability (i.e., Wesley Snipes), studios should not gamble on you. You've passed your sell-by date. The uproar over Mark Wahlberg taking Ryan Gosling's place in The Lovely Bones is telling enough, despite Jackson's claims to have preferred Wahlberg all along².

Reason #2: M. Night Shyamalan.

Let's review:

The Sixth Sense: five stars.

Unbreakable: four stars.

Signs: three and half stars (the half because this was on the cusp of pre-insane Mel Gibson).

The Village: three stars.

Lady in the Water: two stars.

I think you can see where this is going³.

Also, I have an ulterior motive.

I recently joined a website called Kinostat which allows users to estimate the 30-day domestic box office returns of soon-to-be-released films. You can't see other users' estimates, but once a film is released you can see the average estimates. In the case of The Happening, the collective is shooting for a $75 million. My original estimate was $31M, but when I heard that friends - friends, and I mean people who I show some semblance of respect - were thinking about seeing it, I bumped up to $48m just to be safe. If it does have some freaky twist⁴ it won't choke and drown in its own supernatural vomit like Lady in the Water.

And why do I care so much about Kinostat? Because the more accurate your predictions, the more likely it is they will hire you to screen scripts in development. That's the rumor, anyway.

So not only do I know this movie sucks, but I desperately want everyone else to know it too, and not see it. Do it because you love me!

1. Sorry, but producing Entourage, worthy a show as it is, does not count. (And you have Jeremy Piven to thank for that, anyway.)
2. Yeah, just like Brett Ratner was a more suitable director to put a cap on the X-Men trilogy.
3. But who knows? There might be a freaky twist!
4. A virus? Please. Way too obvious. You know what's really freaky? Zombies!

WALL-E

The Must-See-If-You-Care-About-Your-Life, Feel-Good-Unless-You-Have-No-Soul Movie of the Year!

Animated creatures have two purposes: either they are huge, scary, and garnished with so much visual detail that your eye instinctively searches for a vulnerable kill spot; or diminutive, helpless, and equipped with all the aggression of a sea anemone[1]. One of life's great injustices is the overwhelming and unquestioning favoritism of the public, and cuddly rusting robots are no exception. But despite the tremendous power of brainwashing displayed in former Pixar features, this time I'm not buying it.

WALL-E jettisons audiences on an involuntary tailspin into obligatory cooing and, yes, worship of this third dimensional false idol. Whereas audiences would generally get on their knees and beg for a fix of that brand-name cuteness, the thirst for the adorable nigh insatiable, this yet-to-viewer remains unswooning.

Exhibit A: If the personification of robots is a purported glitch, why does EVE display affectionate qualities found in the defunct version of itself? Indeed, the only palatable taste of EVE was the introductory warmongering path of destruction the egg timer-shaped costar unleashes on the title player. THAT'S the kind of future technology I'd like to see! But instead of the ideal, moving story that WALL-E could have followed[2] we are given R2-D2 in Love and told to shut up and like it.

Well, enjoy your facsimile of a creature feature, America. Pixar's humanity is sugarcoated, even in the cold, hollow gears of robots in space.



1. To be fair, those miniature tentacle monsters can get pretty fierce on you if you push them once too hard. Watch yourself.
2. "Old robot meets new robot, old robot loses new robot, old robot goes on cross-galactic search for new robot, old robot finds new robot, old robot starves for empathic connection with new robot only to be devastated by incompatibility, old robot considers suicide, old robot meets human, old robot makes connection and lives happily ever after, or finally dies while dreaming of the Blue Fairy and the music-emitting cranium of Jude Law."

Making Things Up As I Go

It's generally agreed among my friends that I've got some strange opinions. That isn't to say that I'm particularly controversial. I simply come to develop my most passionate viewpoints - coincidentally, all of them concerning Hollywood films - from a foundation of completely unfounded assumptions.

Friend: "Did you see Crash?"
Me: "Ugh, what an awful movie."
Friend: "So you didn't like it?"
Me: "No, I haven't seen it."[1]

This type of reasoning is generally regarded as illogical. I argue that it is simply unusual. Some people feel obliged to wait until after they've seen a film to express feelings about it. This seems rather insecure. When opinion is involved, why not get a head start and make a decision right away? And while this strikes many as presumptious, I maintain that I am merely part of a long tradition of practiced "educated guessers."

Stephen Colbert checks his gut; Luke uses the Force; I foresee M. Night's next movie being a big reel of suck.

I consider myself a gifted bullshitter[2]. This is not to say I am a good liar - in fact, I'm fairly mediocre. I successfully procrastinated on a lot of homework in middle school but I could never pull off a heist, or marry a man for his military access card. But falsehoods and the truth are not the topic of discussion here. We are talking about movies, people! Cinema! The great deception! Isn't suspense of disbelief the moral imperative?

I'll get to my point.

An OkCupid user sent me a message in response to a statement on my profile under the heading "I'm Really Good At...." I had listed "Vehemently opining on movies I haven't yet seen." He challenged. I rallied. I wrote my first (pre?)review, on WALL-E. Then I started this blog.

I will vehemently opine on movies I haven't yet seen. I will probably see them, but that won't change the reviews. Pre-reviews. Whatever. Anyway, I will try to do it regularly, and try not to quit out of shame or laziness, and have fun doing it.

A disclaimer-within-a-disclaimer: I'm a self-conscious writer, and I overcompensate with logorrhea. (And extensive use of a thesaurus. "Wearisome volubility!") Blame my role model: Chuck Klosterman. He's the prince of prattle[3], and Sex, Drugs, & Cocoa Puffs inspired much of my confidence in getting away with writing such nonsensical verbiage. Also, I suspect he makes up half of the things in his books. But that's only because I haven't read any of his reviews.

Enjoy.


1. Yes, I eventually did see it. I was right.
2. Come on, I went to Sarah Lawrence.
3. The Maharaja of Malarky, if you will.