Another 4 Films in One Day (Don't Worry They're Short Ones)
I was severely under-whelmed (okay that's not necessarily a word, so disappointed is more fitting) by the live set that the Head and the Heart played outside, for free, at L.L. Bean on Saturday night, but it was a great time, regardless because of the group of friends I was with. I finally had a chance to catch up with a "long lost" on the road friend, Chase, whom I've known since college days. We met up at Topside Tavern and had some drinks, talked about our lives and got reacquainted with each other after about a year of him being on the road, with Sesame Street Live (that's right, you read that right). We had a few drinks. I had my first tequila shot. We met another one of my new friends, Andrea. Then we headed outside, excited for the FREE show. We all couldn't believe that such a "big" indie band was playing for FREE. Outside, we happened to find my cousin, Josh, as well. Perhaps because it was the wrong kind of crowd, but the band just did not seem to have the energy I was expecting. Although, to be honest, I'd only heard only of their songs. It was a free show, so I decided to go, last minute (well, Saturday morning, after seeing that a few people were going as well). The sound was very low and they were hard to hear from the distance that we stood. We all had a great time, though, and might have ruined other people's good time, because several people around us seemed to gather their things and leave on our account (or maybe they were disappointed by the band's choice of songs, as well). We might have been slightly loud and obnoxious. But, who cares. We had a good time.
Sunday night, I went to see Jimmy Eat World, a band I've been into since 2000, but had never seen live (I know, hard to believe). I met up with Rory (my newfound concert buddy) and a couple of her friends for drinks at Novares Res beforehand, so we missed the opening band, which was cool with me.
Jimmy Eat World had so much energy, which fueled not only their set but also the crowd (everyone was jumping and singing along the entire time). I've also never seen a guy sweat so much in my life than Jim Adkins (lead singer and guitarist) did last night. Perhaps it was because of the heat and also being under the lights. They played pretty much every song I wanted to hear and included songs from deep in their catalogue as well as their most recent, rather forgettable albums. To be honest, they lost my interest, slightly, when they released "Chase the Light" and I can't really listen to "Inventions" thanks in large part to my ex-girlfriend who seemed to be going through a Jimmy Eat World phase the entire length of our relationship, because that album was pretty much the only album she played, on repeat. I got so fucking sick of hearing it that I would often go for a walk or a drive in my car just so I could hear something different. Anyway, check out their setlist from last night's show (and please notice the Taylor Swift cover about halfway through):
This song has helped define my generation.
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Film 216
"The Assassination of a High School President"
starring: Mischa Barton, Reece Thompson and Bruce Willis
Too bad for it that a phenomenal high school film noir titled "Brick" and starring Joseph Gordon Levitt as the lead character/young detective came out 3 years prior to this one and set the bar pretty high for the genre. This plays out like a poor man's version of the aforementioned film (which I would recommend instead of this one). Sure, it's a little more mainstream (for film noir) because of the two "big" names in the cast: Mischa Barton (who really made a name for herself as that most beautiful girl on campus girl in the television show "The O.C.") and a completely miscast Bruce Willis as the dean/principal of the school.
Bobby Funke (a rather unlikable Reece Thompson) is an ambitious sophomore who goes around basically telling people how awesome he is and how he's going to overtake the school, one agenda at a time. He walks into the school newspaper meeting wanting to be the editor, instead, he is assigned to write a profile on the high school's star basketball player. That's when it happens: a stack of SAT exams is stolen/goes missing and Bobby Funke decides that he should be the lead investigative journalist. He writes an article about the star basketball player, but it's not the one expected. Instead he suggests that it's him, Paul Moore, who stole them. This disgraces Paul, which leads to his life's downward spiral: he loses his scholarship to college, he is no longer seen as the popular and good-looking guy, instead he's a cheater. And he loses his girlfriend, Francesca (played by Mischa Barton with just enough of a bitchy-undertone to suggest that she can act, even if typecast). As Bobby Funke digs deeper for the story, he inevitably discovers more than he bargained for and gets himself in some deep, murky water with another group of high-schoolers. He finds out that the high school's entire student body may be corrupt.
The writers clearly had a field day, watching other, more notable film noirs and paying cheap homage to them (re: a driving test turns into a drug bust led at the wheel by Bobby Funke). I guess in most film noir movies there is an obligation for voice-over narration, but here it just seems trite and overused.
I could never tell if this film was trying to take itself seriously, because the characters just are not believable with how they act and how they speak; or if "Assassination" was spoofing its own genre. Either way, it failed for me, much like most of the students in the film are going to fail their SATs if they don't start messing around with each other and start taking their studying more seriously. And Mischa Barton as a bitchy high school girl is believable (re: again "The O.C."), but not so much as the femme fatale who concocts the whole scheme (oops, I just gave away too much).
Skip it and watch "Brick" instead. It is much more intriguing and capturing of your attention. Joseph Gordon Levitt is a much better actor than any of these kids. And shame on Bruce Willis. What was he thinking. The tough, bald-guy act doesn't work here, at all.
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Film 217
"Charlie Bartlett"
starring: Anton Yelchin, Kat Dennings, Robert Downey Jr., Hope Davis
Again, here's a film we've all seen (and loved) before. Look to:
Ferris Bueller's Day Off
Weird Science
Risky Business
Can't Buy Me Love
And you will find the character, the teenage boy, that "Charlie Bartlett" is, no matter how decent Anton Yelchin is as an actor. Sure it presents those awkward teenage years that guys (who were not jocks in high school and found themselves to be misfits) go through, except it doesn't seem universal. It's not really a relatable character or film. Sure, Charlie Bartlett (Yelchin) becomes rather untouchable as the school's self-imposed shrink, with his office in the bathroom, and he gets the girl (Dennings), but isn't that every dude's fantasy in high school. It's like the screenplay was ripped from any guy's high school notebook. Riddle with cliches. He gets the girl. He triumphs over the "oppressive" adults in every teenager's life (here it is most notably Robert Downey Jr.'s principal character). He becomes the most popular guy in school, too. It's like a milder version of a wet dream, minus the sex.
Charlie Bartlett is the product of misguided intentions of his rich mother (who seems completely clueless to everything going on around here, bravo, Hope Davis, for a job well done in that category), whose fortune is really never explained (the patriarch of the family is in jail). Charlie gets booted from another prep school, which forces his mother to enroll him in public school (to teach him a lesson?), where he gets beat up by the school bully, until...Charlie concocts a plan to use his failures to his advantage. He sees a shrink, whom he convinces to write him countless prescriptions for classic drugs that teenage high school kids want. Charlie goes into business with his once-upon-a-time bully. They sell Charlie's pills to other students, who also talk about their problems with him through the concrete bathroom stall wall.
Everything that happens is predictable and so is when it all happens, in the sequence that it happens. Despite its faults, "Charlie Bartlett" works as a sincere and earnest piece of film that tells a story in sequential order to entertain its audience. There really are no plot twists to distract from the point, which is this high school kid will get his life on track eventually, you just have to stay with him, just like you have to with the film.
It's worth a viewing, because the cast makes it work: Robert Downey Jr. seems to always be gold when he seems to be playing himself, to a certain degree. Kat Dennings is wonderful as Principal Gardner's (Downey Jr.'s) daughter and Charlie Bartlett's love interest. She comes off as genuine and endearing, which is a plus. And Tyler Hilton is actually decent as the bully-turned-business-partner-and-nice-guy (sort of). You might know him for his recurring role on the television show "One Tree Hill."
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Film 218
"Splinterheads"
starring: Thomas Middleditch, Rachael Taylor, Christopher McDonald, Lea Thompson
written and directed by: Brant Sersen
I guess we can blame Seth Rogen for mainstreaming the awkward, nice-guy, leading man archetype that has become so popular in films today (most roles are usually filled by Rogen, himself). Here we have Justin (played by Thomas Middleditch), who, even after watching the entire film and his supposed transformation, I'm still not convinced wasn't slightly "touched" as an individual, you know, a sort of "special needs" twenty-something. The way he talked through the entire film made me think there were a couple of screws not just loose but entirely missing from his toolbox. And he's certainly not a "tool." He is gangly and uncoordinated (just watch his attempt to throw a baseball at a carnival dunk-tank). He is a bumbling idiot (sans savant) who has no ambition. He works as a landscaper under his best friend (the fat dude who's main focus is getting laid, but he actually never does). He is a townie (for life?) in his small town.
That is, until the carnival comes into his town. He is soon bewitched by a beautiful blonde girl (Rachael Taylor, whom I need to see more of!) at a gas station, when she swindles $60 from him, in return for pumping his gas. Her name is Galaxy. Enter: Manic Pixie Dream Girl. Status: Here. She is clearly in this picture, at this moment in Justin's life to help him see and figure things out. They have a moment together, which was endearing to see, at a playground. She accepts him for who he is: an overgrown boy who is sweet and stuttering as she nurtures him out of his shell (perhaps because she has an asshole for a boyfriend who also works at the carnival- in fact, he's the one who convinced her to join him on the road).
Perhaps the only "original" idea in this guy-comes-of-age-with-a-girl film is that Justin's Manic Pixie Dream Girl (Galaxy, I mean, hello, what a great name, even thought it's probably carnival-based and not her real name) is into geocaching. Yup, that's right. Geocaching. It's like adult scavenger-hunting for other people's treasure boxes, where you take something and leave something else. It's a GPS-based scavenger hunt, so it's a little bit nerdy, but still pretty freaking cool (especially if a tall, blonde, tattooed girl like Galaxy does it). I mean, if a girl that looked like Rachael Taylor wanted to go geocaching with me on a date, I wouldn't say no. Galaxy gets Justin to do a lot of things that he wouldn't have otherwise tried, hence why she's there. He jumps off a cliff into some water. He geocaches. He kicks her boyfriends ass via karate. He kisses a girl! But the geocaching is the coolest thing about this film, perhaps because I did a Service Learning Project with some 8th/7th graders back in the day, when I was a student-teacher.
But, that's about the only redeeming and original piece I took from this indie, yet cookie-cutter coming-of-age film. Too bad, because it could've had potential.
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Film 219
"Loving Annabelle"
starring: Erin Kelly, Diane Gaidry
Here is a story as old as time, with a bit of a twist: it involves a lesbian love affair. The setting: a private, Catholic, all-girls boarding school. The troubled teenage girl is the daughter of a U.S. Senator. Mom wants to see that there are little to no more distractions or temptations for her rebel daughter. It's almost like she doesn't even know her daughter, like perhaps she's too busy to raise her and get to know her as a person (if she had, maybe she'd known that an all-girls school is like the lion's den for this girl. And the fact that it's Catholic, well that just fuels the fire, as Annabelle (that's the girl, played by Erin Kelly) wears Buddhist prayer beads around her neck all the time. The teacher (played by Diane Gaidry) is a middle-aged blonde woman who seems to have gone through her own rebellious phase as a teenager because she can relate (a bit to well) and eventually forms a bond (which turns carnal about halfway through and they begin an affair, but I wonder why statutory rape isn't brought up in this case, because Annabelle is clearly a minor- is it because they are both woman? it was consensual? or it's simply not the point of the film?).
The film does not have much time to really develop its story or the characters, for that matter, because it runs about 76 minutes long (that's only 1 hour and 16 minutes, in case you needed help). The time becomes a factor as things are rushed along and it almost plays out more like a couple episodes of (your) favorite soap opera, where a couple of female characters' story arcs find them "experimenting," even though these girls are clearly not experimenting. They know who they love. And it's actually not each other. They are both having difficulty getting over their previous loves' lost. They know how to love, too. There's only one sex scene between the two ladies and it's choreographed beautifully, so as to come off more as a soft-core scene that maybe you'd see on Cinemax. I appreciated that the writer and director, Katharine Brooks, decided to go more artsy with this scene, in particular. It wasn't about the sex, necessarily. It was more about the emotional connection these two girls were having.
It was often hard to see things as they transpired on the screen, though, because the film's lighting and setting were both rather dark throughout the film, which didn't really create an ambience, but rather a frustration.
The director tries very hard to be sincere, but as a film, it can never really find its place between being a "fantasy" romance, soft-core fantasy flick, or a serious drama about love. It seems lost in itself over the course of its brief running time, which is too bad, because good films exist in the homosexual genre of films and I think what makes them good is the fact that gender is not the key factor (you can easily replace the targeted gender and the story is still genuine- re: "Brokeback Mountain").
I was disappointed with this one.
Sunday night, I went to see Jimmy Eat World, a band I've been into since 2000, but had never seen live (I know, hard to believe). I met up with Rory (my newfound concert buddy) and a couple of her friends for drinks at Novares Res beforehand, so we missed the opening band, which was cool with me.
Jimmy Eat World had so much energy, which fueled not only their set but also the crowd (everyone was jumping and singing along the entire time). I've also never seen a guy sweat so much in my life than Jim Adkins (lead singer and guitarist) did last night. Perhaps it was because of the heat and also being under the lights. They played pretty much every song I wanted to hear and included songs from deep in their catalogue as well as their most recent, rather forgettable albums. To be honest, they lost my interest, slightly, when they released "Chase the Light" and I can't really listen to "Inventions" thanks in large part to my ex-girlfriend who seemed to be going through a Jimmy Eat World phase the entire length of our relationship, because that album was pretty much the only album she played, on repeat. I got so fucking sick of hearing it that I would often go for a walk or a drive in my car just so I could hear something different. Anyway, check out their setlist from last night's show (and please notice the Taylor Swift cover about halfway through):
This song has helped define my generation.
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(Taylor Swift cover)
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- Encore:
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Film 216
"The Assassination of a High School President"
starring: Mischa Barton, Reece Thompson and Bruce Willis
Too bad for it that a phenomenal high school film noir titled "Brick" and starring Joseph Gordon Levitt as the lead character/young detective came out 3 years prior to this one and set the bar pretty high for the genre. This plays out like a poor man's version of the aforementioned film (which I would recommend instead of this one). Sure, it's a little more mainstream (for film noir) because of the two "big" names in the cast: Mischa Barton (who really made a name for herself as that most beautiful girl on campus girl in the television show "The O.C.") and a completely miscast Bruce Willis as the dean/principal of the school.
Bobby Funke (a rather unlikable Reece Thompson) is an ambitious sophomore who goes around basically telling people how awesome he is and how he's going to overtake the school, one agenda at a time. He walks into the school newspaper meeting wanting to be the editor, instead, he is assigned to write a profile on the high school's star basketball player. That's when it happens: a stack of SAT exams is stolen/goes missing and Bobby Funke decides that he should be the lead investigative journalist. He writes an article about the star basketball player, but it's not the one expected. Instead he suggests that it's him, Paul Moore, who stole them. This disgraces Paul, which leads to his life's downward spiral: he loses his scholarship to college, he is no longer seen as the popular and good-looking guy, instead he's a cheater. And he loses his girlfriend, Francesca (played by Mischa Barton with just enough of a bitchy-undertone to suggest that she can act, even if typecast). As Bobby Funke digs deeper for the story, he inevitably discovers more than he bargained for and gets himself in some deep, murky water with another group of high-schoolers. He finds out that the high school's entire student body may be corrupt.
The writers clearly had a field day, watching other, more notable film noirs and paying cheap homage to them (re: a driving test turns into a drug bust led at the wheel by Bobby Funke). I guess in most film noir movies there is an obligation for voice-over narration, but here it just seems trite and overused.
I could never tell if this film was trying to take itself seriously, because the characters just are not believable with how they act and how they speak; or if "Assassination" was spoofing its own genre. Either way, it failed for me, much like most of the students in the film are going to fail their SATs if they don't start messing around with each other and start taking their studying more seriously. And Mischa Barton as a bitchy high school girl is believable (re: again "The O.C."), but not so much as the femme fatale who concocts the whole scheme (oops, I just gave away too much).
Skip it and watch "Brick" instead. It is much more intriguing and capturing of your attention. Joseph Gordon Levitt is a much better actor than any of these kids. And shame on Bruce Willis. What was he thinking. The tough, bald-guy act doesn't work here, at all.
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Film 217
"Charlie Bartlett"
starring: Anton Yelchin, Kat Dennings, Robert Downey Jr., Hope Davis
Again, here's a film we've all seen (and loved) before. Look to:
Ferris Bueller's Day Off
Weird Science
Risky Business
Can't Buy Me Love
And you will find the character, the teenage boy, that "Charlie Bartlett" is, no matter how decent Anton Yelchin is as an actor. Sure it presents those awkward teenage years that guys (who were not jocks in high school and found themselves to be misfits) go through, except it doesn't seem universal. It's not really a relatable character or film. Sure, Charlie Bartlett (Yelchin) becomes rather untouchable as the school's self-imposed shrink, with his office in the bathroom, and he gets the girl (Dennings), but isn't that every dude's fantasy in high school. It's like the screenplay was ripped from any guy's high school notebook. Riddle with cliches. He gets the girl. He triumphs over the "oppressive" adults in every teenager's life (here it is most notably Robert Downey Jr.'s principal character). He becomes the most popular guy in school, too. It's like a milder version of a wet dream, minus the sex.
Charlie Bartlett is the product of misguided intentions of his rich mother (who seems completely clueless to everything going on around here, bravo, Hope Davis, for a job well done in that category), whose fortune is really never explained (the patriarch of the family is in jail). Charlie gets booted from another prep school, which forces his mother to enroll him in public school (to teach him a lesson?), where he gets beat up by the school bully, until...Charlie concocts a plan to use his failures to his advantage. He sees a shrink, whom he convinces to write him countless prescriptions for classic drugs that teenage high school kids want. Charlie goes into business with his once-upon-a-time bully. They sell Charlie's pills to other students, who also talk about their problems with him through the concrete bathroom stall wall.
Everything that happens is predictable and so is when it all happens, in the sequence that it happens. Despite its faults, "Charlie Bartlett" works as a sincere and earnest piece of film that tells a story in sequential order to entertain its audience. There really are no plot twists to distract from the point, which is this high school kid will get his life on track eventually, you just have to stay with him, just like you have to with the film.
It's worth a viewing, because the cast makes it work: Robert Downey Jr. seems to always be gold when he seems to be playing himself, to a certain degree. Kat Dennings is wonderful as Principal Gardner's (Downey Jr.'s) daughter and Charlie Bartlett's love interest. She comes off as genuine and endearing, which is a plus. And Tyler Hilton is actually decent as the bully-turned-business-partner-and-nice-guy (sort of). You might know him for his recurring role on the television show "One Tree Hill."
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Film 218
"Splinterheads"
starring: Thomas Middleditch, Rachael Taylor, Christopher McDonald, Lea Thompson
written and directed by: Brant Sersen
I guess we can blame Seth Rogen for mainstreaming the awkward, nice-guy, leading man archetype that has become so popular in films today (most roles are usually filled by Rogen, himself). Here we have Justin (played by Thomas Middleditch), who, even after watching the entire film and his supposed transformation, I'm still not convinced wasn't slightly "touched" as an individual, you know, a sort of "special needs" twenty-something. The way he talked through the entire film made me think there were a couple of screws not just loose but entirely missing from his toolbox. And he's certainly not a "tool." He is gangly and uncoordinated (just watch his attempt to throw a baseball at a carnival dunk-tank). He is a bumbling idiot (sans savant) who has no ambition. He works as a landscaper under his best friend (the fat dude who's main focus is getting laid, but he actually never does). He is a townie (for life?) in his small town.
That is, until the carnival comes into his town. He is soon bewitched by a beautiful blonde girl (Rachael Taylor, whom I need to see more of!) at a gas station, when she swindles $60 from him, in return for pumping his gas. Her name is Galaxy. Enter: Manic Pixie Dream Girl. Status: Here. She is clearly in this picture, at this moment in Justin's life to help him see and figure things out. They have a moment together, which was endearing to see, at a playground. She accepts him for who he is: an overgrown boy who is sweet and stuttering as she nurtures him out of his shell (perhaps because she has an asshole for a boyfriend who also works at the carnival- in fact, he's the one who convinced her to join him on the road).
Perhaps the only "original" idea in this guy-comes-of-age-with-a-girl film is that Justin's Manic Pixie Dream Girl (Galaxy, I mean, hello, what a great name, even thought it's probably carnival-based and not her real name) is into geocaching. Yup, that's right. Geocaching. It's like adult scavenger-hunting for other people's treasure boxes, where you take something and leave something else. It's a GPS-based scavenger hunt, so it's a little bit nerdy, but still pretty freaking cool (especially if a tall, blonde, tattooed girl like Galaxy does it). I mean, if a girl that looked like Rachael Taylor wanted to go geocaching with me on a date, I wouldn't say no. Galaxy gets Justin to do a lot of things that he wouldn't have otherwise tried, hence why she's there. He jumps off a cliff into some water. He geocaches. He kicks her boyfriends ass via karate. He kisses a girl! But the geocaching is the coolest thing about this film, perhaps because I did a Service Learning Project with some 8th/7th graders back in the day, when I was a student-teacher.
But, that's about the only redeeming and original piece I took from this indie, yet cookie-cutter coming-of-age film. Too bad, because it could've had potential.
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Film 219
"Loving Annabelle"
starring: Erin Kelly, Diane Gaidry
Here is a story as old as time, with a bit of a twist: it involves a lesbian love affair. The setting: a private, Catholic, all-girls boarding school. The troubled teenage girl is the daughter of a U.S. Senator. Mom wants to see that there are little to no more distractions or temptations for her rebel daughter. It's almost like she doesn't even know her daughter, like perhaps she's too busy to raise her and get to know her as a person (if she had, maybe she'd known that an all-girls school is like the lion's den for this girl. And the fact that it's Catholic, well that just fuels the fire, as Annabelle (that's the girl, played by Erin Kelly) wears Buddhist prayer beads around her neck all the time. The teacher (played by Diane Gaidry) is a middle-aged blonde woman who seems to have gone through her own rebellious phase as a teenager because she can relate (a bit to well) and eventually forms a bond (which turns carnal about halfway through and they begin an affair, but I wonder why statutory rape isn't brought up in this case, because Annabelle is clearly a minor- is it because they are both woman? it was consensual? or it's simply not the point of the film?).
The film does not have much time to really develop its story or the characters, for that matter, because it runs about 76 minutes long (that's only 1 hour and 16 minutes, in case you needed help). The time becomes a factor as things are rushed along and it almost plays out more like a couple episodes of (your) favorite soap opera, where a couple of female characters' story arcs find them "experimenting," even though these girls are clearly not experimenting. They know who they love. And it's actually not each other. They are both having difficulty getting over their previous loves' lost. They know how to love, too. There's only one sex scene between the two ladies and it's choreographed beautifully, so as to come off more as a soft-core scene that maybe you'd see on Cinemax. I appreciated that the writer and director, Katharine Brooks, decided to go more artsy with this scene, in particular. It wasn't about the sex, necessarily. It was more about the emotional connection these two girls were having.
It was often hard to see things as they transpired on the screen, though, because the film's lighting and setting were both rather dark throughout the film, which didn't really create an ambience, but rather a frustration.
The director tries very hard to be sincere, but as a film, it can never really find its place between being a "fantasy" romance, soft-core fantasy flick, or a serious drama about love. It seems lost in itself over the course of its brief running time, which is too bad, because good films exist in the homosexual genre of films and I think what makes them good is the fact that gender is not the key factor (you can easily replace the targeted gender and the story is still genuine- re: "Brokeback Mountain").
I was disappointed with this one.
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