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Thursday, August 31, 2017

Cindy Prascik's Retro-Review: Airplane!










































Dearest Blog: Yesterday it was off to Flashback Cinema at Marquee Cinemas to revist the Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker classic Airplane! on the big screen.

Here there be spoilers.

It's been 37 years since Airplane! originally blazed its hilarious trail through the cinema. If you're thinking surely I can't be serious, well, I am serious...and don't call me Shirley. That line is one of dozens of iconic Airplane! bits that have become so ubiquitous one might be forgiven for failing to credit the picture for its many contributions to our everyday lexicon. In 1980, the brilliant writing/directing team of David Zucker, Jim Abrahams, and Jerry Zucker birthed a comedy masterpiece that was like nothing anyone had ever seen before. Well-regarded dramatic actors play it straight with silly dialogue and ridiculous scenarios. Leslie Nielson, for whom Airplane! launched a second career as a comedy staple, delivers deceptively postive updates deadpan, with a Pinocchio-style growing nose. Our leading man, the handsome Robert Hays, has a "drinking problem" that consists entirely of his wearing the contents of his glass. In a genius piece of casting, Barbara Billingsly (a.k.a. June Cleaver) translates "jive" for a stewardess having difficulty communicating with a pair of travelers. In these more aware times, there are a couple small things that feel a bit tone deaf, but even today that's a small quibble with a groundbreaking comedy that remains one of the funniest movies ever made.

Airplane clocks in at 88 minutes and is rated PG for some language, comic violence, and brief nudity.

My common complaint with comedies, and the reason I seldom pay to see them at the cinema, is that you sit through a two hour movie only to realize you've already seen all the funny parts in a two-minute trailer. Nearly four decades later, Airplane! proves the exception to that rule, a picture that is laugh-out-loud funny from beginning to end, no matter how many times you've seen it.

Of a possible nine Weasleys, Airplane! gets nine. It's an all-time classic.

Until next time...


Sunday, August 20, 2017

MOVIE REVIEW: LOGAN LUCKY







































West Virginia family man Jimmy Logan teams up with his one-armed brother Clyde and sister Mellie to steal money from the Charlotte Motor Speedway in North Carolina. Jimmy also recruits demolition expert Joe Bang to help them break into the track's underground system. Complications arise when a mix-up forces the crew to pull off the heist during a popular NASCAR race while also trying to dodge a relentless FBI agent.
Director: Steven Soderbergh

Cast: Channing Tatum, Adam Driver, Daniel Craig, Katie Holmes, Riley Keough

Release Date: Aug 18, 2017

Genres: Comedy, Crime, Drama

Rated PG-13 for language and some crude comments

Review:

Logan Lucky is a fun energetic return for Steven Soderbergh after a 4 year “retirement.”  This heist caper is like a Dixie styled Ocean’s 11 with a good sense of fun.  It never takes itself too serious and knows how to keep the audiences attention from waning.  Soderbergh’s direction is slick as always, resulting in a breezy film that never really feels long or hits many dips in energy.  The cast is all fully committed with each member giving a fun if occasionally understated performances, except for Daniel Craig who’s clearly having a ball.  Most of the characters are broadly drawn but they do their job in service of  the story.  Only a handful of them feel out of place like Seth McFarland over the top Nascar owner and Hilary Swank’s under baked FBI agent who shows up far to late in the game to be taken seriously.  Still, Logan Lucky a welcome return for Soderbergh and his film making style.

B+

Cindy Prascik's The Hitman’s Bodyguard & Logan Lucky

























Dearest Blog: Yesterday it was off to Marquee Cinemas for the promising pair of The Hitman's Bodyguard and Logan Lucky.
 
Spoiler level here will be mild, nothing you wouldn't know from the trailers.
 
First up: The Hitman's Bodyguard.
 
When a former assassin's testimony is needed at the International Criminal Court, it's up to a disgraced personal security expert to get him there safely.
 
The Hitman's Bodyguard is exactly as advertised, a thrilling and wildly funny action-comedy. Co-stars Ryan Reynolds and Samuel L. Jackson have as much chemistry as the best buddy-comedy pairs, easily playing off one another in hilarious fashion. Gary Oldman digs his cartoonish bad-guy schtick out of storage for a broad, accented turn reminiscent of his mid-90s meat and potatoes. He's not really in the movie as much as I'd have liked, but, as always, he puts his screen time to good use. Action is almost non-stop, though the story beneath never feels underdone. Pretty European locales and a multi-cultural cast give the film a nice international flavor. Only the final chase scene seems to drag on just a bit too long; otherwise, the movie is a perfect balance of well-crafted action and foul-mouthed comedy.
 
The Hitman's Bodyguard clocks in at 118 minutes and is rated R for "strong violence and language throughout."
 
The Hitman's Bodyguard is a rollicking end-of-summer blast. Of a possible nine Weasleys, The Hitman's Bodyguard gets eight.
 
Fangirl points: GARY! (Duh.)
 
Next on the docket: Logan Lucky.
 
A pair of small-town brothers attempts to rob Charlotte Motor Speedway.
 
Dear reader(s), I'll consider it more a warning than a spoiler to tell you one thing about Logan Lucky that you probably didn't guess from the trailer: It's not really a comedy. It's amusing at times, and the overall tone certainly isn't heavy, but it is not the laugh-riot promised by the trailer.
 
Logan Lucky IS a clever, well-acted yarn about a down-on-his-luck West Virginia boy (Channing Tatum) who conscripts his brother (Adam Driver) into a wild plot to rob Charlotte Motor Speedway. The brothers enlist an "in-car-cer-rated" felon (Daniel Craig, playing delightfully against type) to assist with the scheme, which obviously doesn't go entirely as planned, or there'd be no movie. The terrific cast is rounded out by Katie Holmes, Riley Keough, Seth McFarlane, Katherine Waterston, Dwight Yoakam, and Sebastian Stan in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it turn. When Logan Lucky is funny, it's really funny, but unfortunately you've already seen most of what's really funny in the trailer. The twists and turns along our would-be robbers' path are well-plotted and certainly not boring, but the movie is so unlike its advertising that the whole can't help feeling kinda dull.
 
Logan Lucky runs 119 minutes and is rated PG13 for "language and some crude comments."
 
Logan Lucky is a smartly-crafted heist picture whose impact is sadly diminished by misleading advertising. 
 
Of a possible nine Weasleys, Logan Lucky gets six.
 
Fangirl points: Sebastian Stan! 
 
Also, however much it may have been intended to make fun of us, a roomful of people singing Country Roads will always put a teardrop in my eye.
 
Until next time...

Sunday, August 13, 2017

MOVIE REVIEW: ANNABELLE: CREATION







































A couple still grieving the death of their daughter take in children from a local orphanage, but the family are soon terrorized by a demented doll known as Annabelle. Anthony LaPaglia, Miranda Otto, Stephanie Sigman, Talitha Bateman, and Lulu Wilson star in this horror sequel from director David F. Sandberg (David F. Sandberg). ~ Jack Rodgers, Rovi

Director: David F. Sandberg

Cast: Lulu Wilson, Grace Fulton, Anthony LaPaglia, Miranda Otto

Release Date: Aug 11, 2017

Genres: Horror, Suspense/Thriller

Rated R for horror violence and terror

Review:

Annabelle: Creation is a better film than it deserves to be.  Horror clichés run amok in a script that seem more interested in moving from set up to set up than telling a coherent story.  Director David F. Sandberg doesn’t seem to know the meaning of efficiency as his movie is a bloated overlong hodgepodge of things we’ve seen before.  Again, it’s a decent horror film, there are far worse films in the genre that’s for sure, but it’s slightly frustrating because it feels like there is a better film in there somewhere.  The decision to cast Anthony LaPaglia & Miranda Otto seemed like it’d give the film a bit of credibility but the script moves them to the sidelines and barely uses them at all.  What we’re left with is an ensemble film with kid actors who do the best they can but it’s never terribly interesting or engaging.  Annabelle: Creation is the very definition of a wait for cable type of film.

C
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