EC reviews 6 new movies: NICK AND NORAH, APPALOOSA, RELIGULOUS, HOW TO LOSE FRIENDS, RODANTHE and SAVE ME
October 6th, 2008 by Scott Marks
Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist (2008)
Directed by Peter Sollett
Starring: Michael Cera, Kat Dennings, Ari Graynor, Alexis Dziena, Rafi Gavron, Aaron Yoo, Jay Baruchel and Eddie Kaye Thomas as Jesus
Rating: 
Tris (Alexis Dziena) called it quits with Nick (Michael Cera) on his birthday and after 12 volumes of breakup mix tapes, she still finds room in her cold heart to rip on them before tossing them in the garbage. Although they have never met, Norah (Kat Dennings) wishes that she had a guy like Nick that would make her mix tapes. Sound predictable? If goes exactly where you’d expect and with this cast taking us through the motions, it’s a blessing. I didn’t see much to Michael Cera’s performance (or anything else) in Juno. He reminded me of a mildly catatonic Ted Bessell. The naturalistic appeal that once eluded at last brought a smile to my face. Some of it borders dangerously on cute. Nick is the only straight member of a gay boy band named The Jerk Offs, but the nonjudgmental manner in which the group is depicted sends out a message of tolerance and acceptance that contemporary teen audiences don’t get enough of. The film tries too hard to be PG-13. It’s all about a night in the life of a group of partying teens and there’s not one drug or cigarette in sight. There’s plenty of booze on screen, but neither of the title characters drink. Are we in Oz yet? This needed a bit more of an R rated Valley Girl bite to add an edge. Was Nick’s Yugo a subtle nod to Terry the Toad driving Opie’s Edsel, or am I thinking too much? Our lovers meet cute when Norah begs Nick to be her boyfriend for five minutes in order to prove that she has a date. Nick’s bandmates draw designated driver duty and are assignmed the task of driving Norah’s wasted BBF Caroline. Ari Graynor, handing in a hilarious, dead on depiction of a pretty (as in hot) drunk girl. For some reason, the image of Kat Denning sitting on the beach behind Edward Norton and Evan Rachel Wood is one of the strongest I retain from Down in the Valley. She learned early in life to stay away with movies that have “house” in their titles, particularly when they also feature words like “Bunny” and Big Momma’s 2.” Ms. Dennings takes a giant career move forward in this romantic charmer. As a date movie, it lacks the intelligence of The Wackness and the verbal snap of In Search of a Midnight Kiss, N&N managed to quickly win me over. Honestly, it had me in reel one.
Nights in Rodanthe (2008)
Directed by George C. Wolfe
Starring: Diane Lane and Richard Gere
Rating:
This probably would have passed by me had I not filled in at a vacationing friend’s movie group that screened it. (The Cinema Society of San Diego.) Long my favorite genre, melodramas, particularly romantic melodramas, are almost as dead as the western. This isn’t the one to resurrect the order, but it gives it a better shot that most recent soapers. It’s been a long time since Diane Lane and Richard Gere appeared together in The Cotton Club and their recent pairing, Unfaithful, didn’t win my loyalty. Lording over the proceedings is first timer George Wolfe (Tony winning director of Angels in America) and the entire show has two characters and is set in one location. Fortunately, he forgot to pack his hammer (the one most first time theatre directors use to nail movie cameras to the floor), as this is several cuts above canned theatre. Always a sucker for camera movements, there is a spectacular one as Gere approaches the inn that Lane is watching for a friend. The camera flies forward from the back seat, giving us only a momentary glimpse of Gere in the rearview, darts towards the inn and literally sucks the audience in as it swirls around the building before taking us through the front door. The suds are kept to a minimum and Ms. Lane gives the performance of her career. Former students with long memories will be quick to jump down my throat, but I have actually warmed a bit to Richard Gere. (Chicago had nothing to do with it!) Nowhere near as good as Nick and Norah and whole lot less funny.
How to Lose Friends and Alienate People (2008)
Directed by Robert B. Weide
Starring: Simon Pegg, Kirsten Dunst, Meagan Fox, Jeff Bridges, Gillian Anderson, Danny Huston and not enough Miriam Margolyes
Rating:
Made the mistake of going to this twice. (Misread the invite.) Second screening was torture on a stick. RED ALERT TO SAN DIEGO MOVIE PATRONS: AVOID THE AMC MISSION VALLEY THEATRE #19 AT ALL COSTS! They can’t seem to get the digital sound to work properly The barely audible dialogue comes through the front speakers (no directional sound) and the background music tends to wash away much of what the characters are saying. I complained five minutes in and waited another ten before making another lobby run. (Reminds me of the bad old days at Chicago’s Webster Place.) Want to know how low the sound was? The Piracy Busters hired by the studio (their the ones with the cool night vision goggles), these jadrools who do nothing more than to use their glasses to look through girls clothing, even they were complaining to the usher. Still no change. After 45 minutes I left and made sure to say hi to a manager on my way out. Without once setting foot inside the theatre, she assured me that the sound was low and that they were working on it. I explained that the DTS system was on the bum. If DTS is working properly, you never hear splices. For that matter why does a virgin preview print have a splice and hairline scratches that only an improperly aligned set-up table can dispense? On my way out, I stopped at a Subway and after taking one bite of my sandwich notice three small, black bugs crawling across the wax paper it came wrapped. I immediately came home and found solace in the Three Stooges.
As for the movie, it has some laughs. It’s an attempt to turn Simon Pegg into a movie star and he’s much more appealing in this than the appalling Hot Fuzz. It’s a showbiz satire with Pegg playing a tabloid journalist that lands a job at a reputable magazine. Pigs piss on elite partygoers, guests fall into pools, someone vomits in a car, the star’s prize pet mysteriously plunges to its death and the boss’ wife winds up with a hocked-up piece of lunch on her Prada dress. Pegg sparks some laughs playing a dick and it’s always great to watch Jeff Bridges and look at Meagan Fox. Like so many contemporary satires, it’s all too silly and toothless to amount to much more than a few nasty snickers.
Appaloosa (2008)
Directed by Ed Harris
Starring: Ed Harris, Viggo Mortensen, Renee Zellwegger, Jeremy Irons, James Gammon, Lance Henriksen and Timothy Spall, the man that should play Hitchcock
Rating:
Missed the screening and really felt like seeing a western, so I went and payed. Boy, did I pay. With over 20 screens to choose from at Mission Valley, what were the chances that my film du jour would be playing in the s–t-sound #19? To my surprise, I was not the first one to get up and complain. After emitting a couple of loud “Huhs?” that had more reverb than anything coming from the screen, an elderly gent seated two rows behind me left his wife long enough to complain to an usher. With zero chance of juicing the audio, there was no sense in sticking around. Once again, I felt the urge to commune with management and sure enough, it was the same young woman from my Tuesday night, pre-Bugway feast. As if by rote, she somnambulistically began to say, “We are working on…” and then she made the connection. Welcome to Hell Town — Your worst nightmare is back. “Don’t tell me you’ve been here since Tuesday night working on it?” She laughed. Why hasn’t it been fixed? Better still, if the theatre is not working up to capacity, why book a film that’s in its opening week? Why play a film at all? Hang an “Out of Order” sign on the door and double up Tyler Perry s The Family That Preys with The Miracle of St. Anna. I went to Fashion Valley this morning to see the 100 minutes of Appaloosa that I missed.
Remove the few “f–ks” from the dialog and Appaloosa feels like one of those old fashioned CinemaScope westerns that audiences ate up in the 50s and 60s. Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen play a pair of Marshalls-for-hire contracted to rid the title town of bad guy Jeremy Irons. The cast, filled with many familiar faces, is uniformly on their game, but what’s with Renee Zellwegger? When did she lose all of her appeal and begin looking like a spokeswoman for Real Lemon Alumade? I don’t care if she is one of only three woman we see in Appaloosa (apart from Renee there is one waitress and the town whore), that is still no excuse for every man in town hitting on her. To Ed Harris credit, his film never tries for blockbuster status like 3:10 to Yuma and is content to be exactly what it is: a genre picture. It’s nice to see the old west untainted by endless explosions dealt through fast, MTV cuts.
Religulous (2008)
Directed by Larry Charles
Starring: Bill Maher
Rating:
When Sacha Baron Cohen or Howard Stern take on easy targets, they do it with wit and style. Bill Maher does it with the greatest of ease. Religulous, with it’s salvos at religion as an “invisible product” has a lot of laughs, but I frequently found myself sniggering more at the Monty Pythonesque juxtaposition of found footage than Mahr’s schtick. That clip of Robert Blake in Hell Town…WOW! Mahr manages a few sharp observations amidst the goofing. He asks one crazed zealot, “If you’re going to a better place, why not kill yourself now?” The one ray of hope Marh delivers is that 16% of Americans are against all forms of organized religion. While still in the minority, the number of confirmed non-believers was certainly larger than I would have guessed, particularly from a country that elected a man ordained by Christ as its president.
Save Me (2007)
Directed by Robert Cary
Starring: Chad Allen, Robert Gant, Juduth Light and Stephen Lang
Rating:
Find the Jesus way to ex-gay at Genesis, a Christian recovery program specializing in sexual recovery. It’s a homophobic Harrad Experiment in reverse. The first hour plays like a Mormon four-wall with a big enough budget to afford recognizable actors, in this case Stephen Lang and Judith Light, trying hard for an Oscar she’ll never get. Sex and drug addict Chad Allen is sent to Genesis, and instead of finding a cure for his “gay affliction,” he falls for group mascot Robert Gant.As predictable as it sounds. Take out a couple of brief sex scenes and occasional profanity and this will feel right at home when it plays The Lifetime Channel. Theatre owners across America report that approximately 30 minutes into screenings of Save Me, patrons bolt through the exit doors screaming out the film’s title.
Tags: appaloosa, Film Reviews, how to lose friends and alienate people, Movie reviews, nick and nora, nick and norahs infinite playlist, Nights in Rodanthe, religulous, same be, VideoShare: 
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