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Get Smart is a movie best appreciated by itself. Fans of the television series are just setting themselves up for disappointment if they expect more than the occasional nod towards the 1960’s classic. In isolation (a cone of silence, if you will)) it can be enjoyed as a light action adventure with above average comedy thanks to the casting of Steve Carell.

Carell is the master of making mundane statements hilarious with a mere twitch of his face or a vocal inflection. He plays Maxwell Smart (Don Adams’ former domain), a bumbling analyst desperately vying to become a field agent for CONTROL (the kind of bizarre, but far more credible agency the CIA would be if Alan Arkin truly did run it). When circumstance thrusts him toward the promotion he’s only dreamed of, he’s partnered with a deeply unimpressed Agent 99 (Anne Hathaway). The Chief (Arkin) assigns them to track down a couple of nuclear weapons stolen by KAOS, before they get the chance to lob them in the direction of the US. Cue shenanigans, sight gags, dance-offs, betrayal and most memorably (for me) a sword fish.


It’s difficult to fault the effort put in by anyone. Carell is loveably eccentric, and his chemistry with Hathaway is surprising. Surprising because he could have fathered her. No neat little plot add-on takes away from the awkwardly evident age difference, but their banter remains engaging. I just wish they’d left it at that. Hathaway has a neat way with the comic touch herself, while Arkin is prone to completely stealing a scene or two. Dwayne Johnson (a name that cannot be uttered without acknowledging that it used to be The Rock) is amusing, and then confusing.

Ultimately this is a movie that got made because of the television show, but its biggest fault turns out to be that it’s lining itself up for comparison. This isn’t a witty, subversive satire, it’s a broad farce. Change the name and you would have had a perfectly serviceably film without the cult classic association. A lot of cop movies could have been a Law & Order adaptation if they just used the name. When the name is used it’s about branding, not creative necessity (it’s also probably about copyright…). Fans may hold a grudge because of this, but hopefully they’ll get over it and take the whole thing on its own merits.


If nothing else you've got to give them props for a sparkling Bush/Cheney riff. So many take the obvious, over the top route, getting carried away from comic potential into the kind of dumb territory that has been done to death. That is neatly avoided here.

Get Smart is fine fun. It’s not necessarily intelligent, but it is more than a little… smart.
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Sex and the City: size does matter

June 11th 2008 05:00
Sex and the City gives fans of the show everything they’ve been asking for. Whether they’ll actually leave satisfied is up in the air. People who never got on board the original escapades of New York’s favourite foursome of designer walking product placement need not apply.

The film begins with a neat set of opening credits, including an update of the television theme. They’ve made a smart move by acknowledging the passage of time and not picking up from exactly where they left off. It allows the movie to have a hint of being its very own entity, while still tying it back and refreshing us with the characters situations.

Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) and Big (Chris Noth) are happily unmarried, until suggestions both subtle and overt shove them in the direction of an aisle. She gets swept away with the joys of wedding planning, while he starts to get cold feet. Meanwhile, Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) discovers a shocking betrayal, Samantha (Kim Cattrall) gets bored and fat (not me being cruel, it’s an actual plotline) and Charlotte (Kristin Davis) provides comic relief and emotional support while pondering how perfect her life is. And they wear some clothes.

‘Wear some clothes’ doesn’t really do justice to a movie which gives Carrie a full five minutes to list designer names while wearing a range of their dresses. I’m not saying weave through conversation, I am saying list. This is what people have already signed on for long ago, so it shouldn’t concern those that choose to pay to see it.

Structurally the whole project struggles to escape its half hour origin. It kind of feels like watching an entire series compressed, which would be fine, except it makes you realize how much the back third of a series is capable of dragging if watched as a slab. The real, emotional climax comes far too early, and the slow limp towards a conclusion takes up at least half of the movie. In its one offensive note, a great deal of that half somehow feels like filler. Namely Jennifer Hudson.

No offence to Jennifer, I’m sure she’s lovely and we all know the girl can sing, but her character and arc is a completely pointless addition (especially when the writer’s couldn’t figure out what to do with Charlotte). It’s as if they needed to justify getting her to sing the track over the closing credits (does anyone remember seeing Celine Dion’s uplifting sequence working as Kate Winslet’s assistant on the Titanic? They must have cut that bit). She takes up valuable screen time that could have been beefing up Samantha’s interesting, but relatively un-explored dilemma.

On the positive front, the friendships between the main four characters remains the glue that holds this thing together. Also, the fashion, which is apparently a big deal. Overall it’s funny, and moving despite the way it can drag. The key is not to let expectation and anticipation ruin the whole thing – hype can be deadly for a movie, so inoculate yourself at the door.
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Indiana Jones: 4 times as old

May 27th 2008 03:16
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is a mediocrity, wrapped in an enigma tied up in a bow of expectation. I know, I died a little on the inside as well. That’s not to say that Indy 4 is horrid, far from it. There are plenty of mediocre films around, they’re perfectly watchable, they just also happen to be flawed and uneven. We accept mediocre films and give them fabulous box office rewards. I embrace mediocrity like the irritating little brother it is – loveable, but occasionally grating. I do not embrace mediocre Indiana Jones.

The movie opens perfectly. We’re straight in to the action, with Harrison Ford in whip-cracking form and classic retro villains all round. The period detail is right, and the political tensions of the day (reds under beds, the cast of Grease brawling in milk bars) provides a nice subtle score against which everything is set.

An ageing Indiana is struggling in his day job, when the son of a former love interest begs him to help save her from Russian rogues in South America. The son is Shia LaBeouf, who is a perfectly matched energetic and charismatic foil for our hero. The head Russian is Cate Blanchett, who is over the top and mesmerizing in equal doses. Ultimately all involved end up in a race to find the Crystal Skull, and its matching Kingdom.

So far, so Indy. The plot is a little leakier than usual, but a decade or so is bound to lead to incontinence. Almost every other character but the described three seems to be there to provide necessary information. This is a little annoying when you consider two of those characters are played by John Hurt and Ray Winstone, who are wasted. Even Marion Ravenwood, recurring from the first movie (if you didn’t know that already, you probably don’t even care about the series anyway) goes from initially invigorating to incredibly schmaltzy.

I can pinpoint where the movie ultimately jumps the shark. It’s the point when Shia starts swinging through the trees like Tarzan in order to catch up with the three car chase hurtling towards the cliff. And he’s assisted by a gang of monkeys. Indiana has never been about realism, but somehow it’s always stayed away from farce. Until that point.

Then there’s the realisation of what the Crystal Skull is (which the audience has figured out an hour earlier) which sends it into the X Files zone. At the same time, you can’t help but have the strangest sense of deja vu. It feels like you’ve seen some of these plot points before, only with Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz. Finally, as the closing credits roll, and you play the climax in your head the strangest thing occurs to you. Everything Indiana did (aside from initially rescuing his friends) ends up being completely irrelevant and pointless. His actions were actually unnecessary. This does not an equation for satisfaction make.

Most of the disappointment is our fault. We allowed this movie to be over-hyped like hype was in short-supply. Hype is never in short supply (see Sex and the City). I like to think that in a year’s time, once it’s all died away, I will be able to view this again and enjoy it the way I enjoy the first three in the franchise. All giddy adventure, less vague amusement and recognition. All the ingredients are there, it’s just the writing that runs out of puff.
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I have found it impossible to get worked up about Miss Pettigrew Lives For a Day in any way. It’s a really nice movie, and yes I mean that as a back-handed compliment. It’s sweet, inoffensive, and peppered with a few lovely subtle moments. It’s also oddly bland.

In the 1930’s the titular Miss Pettigrew, brought to us by the vaguely befuddled Frances McDormand, is a failed governess in desperate need of a job. Failing that, she’ll take a meal. Improvising wildly, she finds herself in the service of aspiring actress Delysia Lafosse. We follow the pair over 24 hours as romance, hijinks and other screwball events follow – all of them inevitable


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Made of Honour is Frankenstein’s romcom – it may walk and talk, but you can’t help but stare at the stitching marks. So many brilliant and mediocre films have been born into this genre’s cannon that writers everywhere must surely be banging their heads against walls in the fight to come up with an original idea. But in most cases, as in this one, it is apparent they have given up before the muse descended upon them (or not even tried at all).

I am an unashamed lover of the romcom, but even this uneven offering tried my patience. Patrick Dempsey plays uber bachelor Tom, whose only real commitment is to his friendship with Michelle Monaghan’s Hannah. Only when Hannah finds herself a strapping Scotsman and gets engaged does Tom wake up and smell the cliché. He’s in love with her. Have I ruined the twist? What follows are his varied attempts to win her, a trip to Scotland, a tree throwing competition, and then (bizarrely) an overt affection for dogs becomes a major plot point… and suddenly you’re walking out of the cinema


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Iron Man: rust resistant

May 6th 2008 04:50
Robert Downey Jr is a golden god. The problem with the heroes in so many comic book adaptations is that their everyday personas (Clark Kent, Peter Parker) are so insipid it neuters their alter ego. It seems that aside from doing a gritty re-imagining of Batman, the only certain solution to that problem is to cast Downey. Hence golden god status.

Iron Man sounds cool and relevant (playboy weapons dealer develops super suit to fight the evil he has unwittingly created), but it could have gone the other way (Jumper style selfish git, puts on expressionless super suit to protect equally expressionless face). The key to what makes Iron Man work is the casting, and the general attitude of director Jon Favreau. That attitude is smart-arsed conviction, as previously seen in the script he wrote for Swingers


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Smart People is like the bastard first pancake of Little Miss Sunshine and Juno. Only it came third. It’s good, but you know it’s been done better in circumstances both funnier and more moving.

Dennis Quaid stars as Lawrence, a widower and English professor in the grandest tradition of Ebenezer Scrooge – if he were any more Grinch-like I’d be worried about Christmas. Ellen Page is his daughter Vanessa, a teenage Republican stalwart with an unfortunate desire to emulate her father. Shaking up their insular cocoon of self-righteous indignation is the arrival of love interest Sarah Jessica Parker (for Lawrence) and wayward uncle Thomas Hayden Church (for Vanessa


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The Painted Veil is a slow dragging beast that steadily, even a little painfully, turns out to be a thoroughly involving flick. Based on the novel of the same name by W Somerset Maugham, this love story takes so much time introducing and establishing its characters you can’t help but feel for them despite many of their early selfish foibles.

Naomi Watts plays Kitty, pretty, shallow and eager to escape her family. Edward Norton, as Walter, offers her that out when he proposes to her. She readily accepts despite the fact that she barely knows, and certainly doesn’t love him. They move to China where he works as a doctor, and one ill-fated affair later a War of the Roses turn sees them seeking to drive each other mad with fury in some rural province overrun with a cholera epidemic. As we all know, cholera does not a merry movie make, but there are moments of levity that stop the whole thing from ever being depressing. Plus, that Walter sure does know how to take himself some revenge


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Forgetting Sarah Marshall: who?

April 21st 2008 07:12
Though flawed, Forgetting Sarah Marshall is head and shoulders above most of the formulaic spawn of the Hollywood romcom machine. Predictable in the main plot, it’s the moments that string it all together that manage to surprise.

Peter Bretter (played by Jason Segel… from How I Met Your Mother) is devestated when his girlfriend, television star Sarah Marshall (Kristen Bell) dumps him. Seeking solace and escape in Hawaii, he finds neither when Sarah turns out to be staying in the same hotel with her new flame, a famous rocker called Aldous. He does find some comfort in the friendship of concierge Rachel. You can put the rest of the pieces together blindfolded, but the experience is much better than the summary suggests


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I am so very late on the review front for this movie it seems unnecessary. Unnecessary is never really something that halts me in my tracks, but I will be brief.

St Trinian’s, a remake of a broad comedy from 1954 called The Belles of St Trinian’s, is a rather uneven, mostly amusing, but ultimately forgettable British romp. If you are over 25 you may want to walk out, if you are under 12 the content is quite inappropriate but you’ve probably already googled half of it. For all of those in between there is some light, anarchic joy to be had from the proceedings


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