Me and You and Everyone We Know- **** -B **1/2-S

Brandon:
In the opening of the movie, we are watching a married couple split up. The father, Richard (John Hawkes) is confused. He doesn't seem to understand what's happening, or why. "Let's have a ceremony!" He suggests. His wife is annoyed, probably even more so when his last minute ceremony goes awry.

This sets the stage for the entire movie. The movie focuses mostly on Richard and performance artist Christine (writer/director Miranda July), who are hesitantly trying to begin a relationship that neither one understands. But there are several characters, all interconnected in some way, who are facing the same problems- reconciling what they think of love with what it truly is.

This is the best plot outline I can really give, without giving away the magic of the movie. There are several plots which flow through the film, involving characters as young as six, demonstrating the hopes and fears of love and sex. Much of it is very funny (particularly one scene in the middle, which has even become a tagline for the movie- "))<>(( Forever"), some of it is sad, and much of it makes the characters question what they're getting themselves into.

I have seen critics saying things like it's this years Sideways, but I think it has more in common with 2003's Lost in Translation.

Sarai:**1/2
I tend to disagree with Brandon on this one. I thought most of the characters were little more than caricatures with no real depth. The shy, afraid to take a chance "video artist" (If you can call what she does art, I think it looked more like what a junior high kid in the eighties might do with a camcorder) meets a slightly bent but doting father and they dance around courtship. boring. I had a real problem with some of the adult dialogue in this film, like Richard proclaiming that he wants to be swept off of his feet and his children to have super powers and he's ready for great things to happen.
The children are really the more interesting part of this film. Without giving anything away, they are the comedy and the life force behind this film. If only the adult characters in this film had been better written, it had the potential to be a really good film.

Be Cool- **1/2

I knew walking into Be Cool that I really shouldn't expect much. You know when the press focuses on "Travolta and Thurman dancing AGAIN!!!!" instead of the actual movie, you're in trouble. And what I got was, like last year’s Ocean’s Twelve, a movie trying so hard to be cool that it was just annoying.

It’s a few years after Get Shorty, and Chili Palmer (John Travolta) is tired with the movie business. He soon finds himself in cahoots with the friend’s wife Edie (Uma Thurman) to produce Linda Moon (Christina Milian), a talented singer trying to make it big. Unfortunately, Linda under contract to Raji (Vince Vaughn) and Nick Carr (Harvey Keitel), who aren't about to let go of a good thing. Palmer also has to contend with the aforementioned Russian mob, and gangsta rap group The WMDs led by the silly Dabu (Andre Benjamin), and managed by Sin LaSalle (Cedric the Entertainer), who blame Palmer for his friend dying without paying them their royalties. So you'd think there would be enough plot to sustain the two-hour movie, right?

Wrong. With so much going on, nothing seems to really be happening. You can feel director F. Gary Gray trying very hard to be as cool as Sonnenfeld was in Get Shorty, but missing the mark entirely. The movie derails itself by stopping every fifteen minutes or so to become a music video for Christina Milian. The worst is a long scene of her singing "Crazy" onstage with Aerosmith. Because, I guess, we all needed to hear that song one more time... There is also a short pause about halfway through the movie to not only showcase the Black Eyed Peas, but to have Travolta and Thurman dance together. Great. The dance is not only trying to pointlessly piggy-back on Pulp Fiction, but goes on way too long. And really, would Chili Palmer be going to Black Eyed Peas concerts?

I blame most of the movie's problems on the screenplay by Peter Steinfeld, which is more concerned with making stupid Hollywood in-jokes than putting together a credible movie. The first line of the movie is Travolta moaning, "I hate sequels." Ha ha ha. The movie borrows so much from Get Shorty. Sure, some similarities are inevitable, but this comes off as just lazy. Again, the bad guy has the reluctant bodyguard. Again, the one thing everyone is trying to get their hands on is squirreled away in a place under police surveillance etc…

There are bright points to the movie though. The Rock, as the gay, wanna-be actor/bodyguard Eliot, is hilarious. He creates the most interesting and funny character in the movie...he even manages to make the eyebrow joke work. Sadly, Vince Vaughn starts out funny, but by the end the tiresome “White-guy-acting-black” just becomes grating. Andre Benjamin is hilarious as the gangsta without a clue. His best scene is toward the end, while drinking tea, prompting one of the best lines, "Dabu! Tea is NOT GANGSTA!"

I can't really recommend this movie. It may vaguely entertain fans of Get Shorty (or The Rock), but I would recommend just putting in Get Shorty and remembering how cool crime capers SHOULD be.

Heights ****

The movie opens with Glenn Close teaching an acting class on Shakespeare which immediately made me jealous of all the extras who got to sit there and get acting lessons from Glenn Close! But that's beside the point, her character, Diana, is a one-woman powerhouse of presence and charisma, but it's almost all facade. The story follows the intertwined (sometimes unexpectedly so) lives of five New Yorkers through one 24-hour period. Based on the play by Amy Fox, who also wrote the screenplay, Heights never panders or overplays it's hand, but instead gives us a view into the real lives of these complex characters.

Isabel, played with great depth by Elizabeth Banks, is Diana's daughter and a photographer trying to make a name for herself in her profession while planning her wedding to Jonathan (James Marsden). Jonathan is a corporate lawyer with a past full of secrets that begin unraveling at the very beginning of the film. While some of his deceits come off almost clichéd - man struggles with sexual orientation - the ending is really an unexpected twist. The fourth character we meet is Alec (Jesse Bradford) who seems to be in the film for little more than a few laughs and his puppy dog eyes. He plays an aspiring actor auditioning for Diana's latest play who happens to live in the same building as Isabel and Jonathan. There's also Peter whose sole role in the movie is to interview ex-lovers of a famous photographer, in the process pulling the thread that will begin the unraveling of Jonathan. Also thrown into the mix is a side-plot of Diana's hidden, but very palpable, heartache over her open marriage that is never fully explored.

Overall I really liked this movie for its honesty and emotional depth. With all of the plot layers at work in this film, it's still simply about people trying to find or hide from who they really are. There are so many opposites at work; with Isabel trying valiantly to become what she thinks will make her happy while missing the very things that will. Diana constantly labors to keep up appearances while being truly miserable and afraid to change her situation and even more afraid that her daughter will make the same mistakes. The internal struggles of both female characters and the dynamics of this mother-daughter relationship are truly what make this film so mesmerizing to watch. Some of the technical aspects like the split-screen editing and shooting scenes in order to evoke a "voyeuristic" viewpoint simply didn't work, but the acting stands on it's own.

William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice- ***

There are several problems with adapting Shakespeare to the screen. The big one is the language, and the fact that many actors just simply cannot say it without slipping into a strange melodramatic chanting. Second is the fact that everyone wants to put their personal stamp on it; changing the time, changing the setting, changing the focus. Sometimes this works, such as in Ian McKellen's Richard III. But The Merchant of Venice misses the mark.

The Merchant of Venice is a very problematic play, written as a comedy from the very anti-Semitic viewpoint of the 1590s. It definitely makes Shylock the bad guy, and revels in his defeat at the end. Rather than hide from it, this movie takes a more serious viewpoint, trying to make Shylock a sympathetic character, a man driven to his barbaric demands by the ill treatment of those around him. This does work, but only to a point. And when it cross cuts to the romantic subplot, it doesn't work at all.

The movie begins by showing Antonio (Jeremy Irons) spitting on a local Jew, Shylock (Al Pacino), who makes a living giving out of loans for interest. Antonio is a wealthy merchant, but all of his funds are tied up in shipping efforts. Bassanio is a young playboy who wants to set himself up as wealthy and travel to win the hand of Portia (Lynn Collins), and he asks Antonio to lend him some cash. Antonio agrees, and has to reluctantly go to Shylock for a loan of his own. Shylock agrees, but demands a grisly bond if the loan is not paid back by a certain date- a pound of Antonio's flesh. The romantic/comedic subplot involves Portia, who wants to marry, but is held by her father's wish that she must put each suitor in front of three boxes of gold, silver and lead. Whoever picks the correct box will be her husband, and Bassanio is determined to win.

The Merchant of Venice cuts back and forth between the comedic plot and the serious plot, and attempts to solve the problem by making everything serious. This does work for the Shylock, especially during the "If you prick us, do we not bleed?" speech. This is a movie that reminds you just how good Al Pacino really can be. While you don't agree with Shylock's revenge, you find yourself understanding where it comes from. The problem comes with lines like "Oh my daughter! Oh my ducats!" He was written to be a greedy, contemptuous man, placing his daughter on the same level as his money, and lines like this undercut the sympathy the film is trying to build.

The other problem is slowing down the Portia subplot. Particularly the coda of the movie, which is supposed to be played for laughs. I personally dislike the last act of the play, and I like it even less in this movie, which tries to give weight to a stupid practical joke, and winds up just making the last 15-20 minutes of the movie laborous.

While these changes do affect the movie, there are still some wonderful things about it. The cinematography is excellent, painting a dark, craggy view of Venice and contrasting it with the opulent beauty of Portia's island mansion. The performances are almost all excellent as well. Pacino, Irons and Fiennes all have a good sense of the dialogue, and manage to speak it as if they were conversing in everyday language. Collins, as Portia, is the only weak link, and I can't decide if this is because of his performance or because of the way the movie was done. I never thought she was bad, but I never found myself as interested when she appeared on screen.

This movie has been praised for its revisionist take on a difficult play, and I can see and appreciate what they were trying to do. It is the kind of thing where you want to applaud the effort, even though the finished product only works half the time. Shakespeare fans will appreciate this, but all others might want to be wary.

War of the Worlds - ***

Speilberg has proven he can deliver a movie. He invented the big summer movie with Jaws, and has further proven himself with the Indiana Jones films and more serious efforts like Schindler’s list. But I don’t know what’s going on lately, since he’s snuggled up to Tom Cruise. Hot on the heels of the underwhelming Minority Report (the previous Speilberg/Cruise friendship movie), we now have the underwhelming War of the Worlds.

I haven't read the book, and it's been years since I saw the original movie, but from what I can tell the bare minimum was taken from the earlier versions. Which is fine, really, you could probably make a hundred different stories revolving around a group of people trying to outrun giant walking tripods. This one focuses on Tom Cruise, who plays Ray Ferrier, a divorced, blue collar father of two. His wife Mary Ann (Miranda Otto) is leaving the kids with him for the weekend. The oldest is teenage Robbie (Justin Chatwin), who is of course sullen and withdrawn, because every teenager has to be in movies any more. The younger is Rachel (Dakota Fanning), who is surprisingly good at playing the person stuck between the warring father and son. The weekend starts out bad, and then gets worse when a lightning storm not only knocks out every piece of electrical equipment in the area (except, of course, for the guy who has to be there filming the aliens awakening with his camcorder), but also awakens a giant alien tripod mere blocks from the Ferrier household. The Ferriers make a death-defying escape, and plan a mission to head to Boston to find Mary Ann. Because, I guess, mom can fight tripods…

The bulk of the movie are the few days spent trying to stay alive as they travel from New York to Boston, having the regimented close encounters along the way. This is where Spielberg reminds what he still has the ability to do. The action scenes are suspenseful and horrifying. And while every laser blast manages to evaporate everyone BUT Tom Cruise, I found myself only thinking of that later after the movie was over. The tripods, while looking slightly ungainly, are frightening, and every time I heard the fog-horn blast they made as they appeared in the horizon, I found myself squirming in my seat.

But, for every time a tripod appears on the horizon, there has to be a quiet family scene, and here is where the movie stumbles. Tom Cruise is at best when he doesn't have to be too terribly emotional, and while he is a good choice for playing the angry, blue collar Ray, he seems a bit lost in the smaller scenes. Robbie is your typical impulsive teenager. He could honestly be written out of the movie and you'd lose basically nothing. The real stand out is Dakota Fanning, who I think I dislike only because she was in Uptown Girls. While she basically has to stand around and look scared, she is the only one who manages to inject a true sense of fear and horror into the movie. The only other character who seems to share any amount of screen time with the Ferrier family is a miscast Tim Robbins as an ambulance driver-turned-survivalist.

It is really at the point when Tim Robbins shows up that the movie begins to falter. Rather than continue with huge action sequences, the movie gives us TWO scenes of things in the basement that the characters must hide from. Both of these scenes are uninspired remakes of scenes from Minority Report and Jurassic Park (in fact, one shot is directly lifted from the Raptor/kitchen chase). And, is it just me, or do the aliens look almost exactly like the aliens from Independence Day? I will give Speilberg credit for a confrontation scene between Cruise and Robbins I didn’t see coming. But then, we're led into the extremely anti-climactic climax, and of course the schmaltzy end, which I won't give away, but you'll see coming fairly easily.

So this is what eventually lost me: the movie’s inability to be consistent. For every great scene, there has to be something that happens to slow everything down to a crawl. Which in the long run, isn’t SO bad. It’s just isn’t so great. So if you want to see giant action scenes, and are able to ignore the silly in-between stuff, and the totally lame conclusion, you could do worse. Much worse.