The absurdly macho pyrotechnics of Smokin' Aces. - By Dana Stevens - Slate Magazine

The absurdly macho pyrotechnics of Smokin' Aces. - By Dana Stevens - Slate Magazine: "The weirdly magnetic Piven is the only reason I still watch HBO's Entourage (which I've inveighed against here and here). He's a mercurial actor, one of the few I could imagine effecting the transition from magician to gang lord. (Isn't it always the way? One minute they're pulling bunnies from hats, the next they're collecting protection money.) But Piven is powerless to combat the deep stupidity of this role, and his performance ranges from adequate (in the comic scenes) to excruciating (in the 'tragic' ones). At the movie's puzzling dramatic nadir, Buddy stares blearily into the bathroom mirror, wearing a single bright-blue contact lens, as a tear rolls down his cheek. I wish my insurance covered Lasik surgery too, but you don't see me crying about it."

Grindhouse is bloody good. - By Dana Stevens - Slate Magazine

Grindhouse is bloody good. - By Dana Stevens - Slate Magazine: "But Death Proof is a reminder of what there was to like about Tarantino in the first place: his uncanny ear for dialogue that's at once naturalistic and deliriously wordy, his kinetic action sequences, and his voracious love for cinema in all its incarnations, especially the sleazy ones. With its lean 90-minute running time and a near-complete absence of CGI, Death Proof feels like an experiment in austerity after more than a decade in which Tarantino had free run of the special-effects candy store. And it works fabulously, much to the surprise of this generally Tarantino-weary writer."

If I want original I will so somewhere else, look somewhere other than the "romantic comedy" genre. Part of why I liked Music and Lyrics is the fact that it is so predictable. the genre has a rhythm. Meeting then growing attraction then signs of death, then break up, then the great climactic reconnection. The pattern of the story is just a canvas, however, just like the death of the bad guy at the end of an action movie. How the bad guy dies, and how bad he is is the real art, just like in a Hugh Grant movie, variations in how charming, how funny, how much he can avoid annoying you, are the tools of self-expression.

The movie itself, is about two strangers writing a pop-song, and it's funny if you get the references, if you know who Wham or A-ha or Duran Duran were. Barrymore is, as she always is, winning and sweet and vulnerable to the point where you wish that people like that existed in real life and that you knew them and they liked you. Grant has a very definite sense of humor, I always knew it, even when he was annoying me and in this movie, beset by age, he shows it more than in any film before. They sold me the story, and I liked it.

Music & Lyrics

Hugh Grant ... Alex Fletcher
Drew Barrymore ... Sophie Fisher
Brad Garrett ... Chris Riley
Kristen Johnston ... Rhonda Fisher
Campbell Scott ... Sloan Cates
Scott Porter ... Colin Thompson


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I never got to see this one because none of the video stores I frequented had it in stock. It's not your average person's idea of a comedy. Not to say that there is anything wrong with liking average comedy, just that this is isn't it.

One sentence summary: Amoral asshole dad tries to win back the favor of his genius family.

No, it doesn't sound like much with a one-sentence summary, but it's one of those movies that work on quirk and low-key dryness. I would have said that Bill Murray would have been excellent as Royal Tenenbaum except Gene Hackman did such a brilliant job. Is there anything quite as funny as an uninhibited, remorseless liar? Well, in this movie there isn't. Hackman as Tenenbaum steals every scene and makes you like him long before he tries to change his ways. Something about the fact that he never gives up, is never discouraged, reads spy-novels and encyclopedias.

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