Monthly Archives: January 2015

The Theory of Everything (Movie Review)

Oscar-nominated stars Eddie Redmayne (Les Miserables) and Felicity Jones, who you may remember from the 5-second tease she got in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 as Felicia Hardy. Godammit, Sony, first you squander Paul Giamatti, and now this?

Right, enough with the filler posts, it’s time to look at  one of the most brilliant men to ever  live on this planet of ours. One who has tested the boundaries of physics and changed the way many people think about the universe.

It’s time to examine: Dr. Stephen Hawking’s love life!!!

You’re elated. I can tell.

 The Theory of Everything

 Directed by: James Marsh

 Produced by: Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner, Lisa Bruce, Anthony McCarten

 Screenplay by: Anthony McCarten

 Genre: Biographical romantic drama

 Based on: Travelling to Infinity: My Life with Stephen by Jane Wilde Hawking

Starring: Eddie Redmayne, Felicity Jones, Charlie Cox, Simon McBurney, David Thewlis, Harry Lloyd, Emily Watson, Maxine Peake

Music by: Jóhann Jóhannsson

Plot: In 1963, Stephen Hawking (Eddie Redmayne) is just your average brilliant astrophysics student attending prestigious Cambridge University, where his hobbies include math, physics, not having a topic for his thesis, and hanging out with his buddy, Viserys Targaryen from Game of Thrones. One day, while doing whatever it is that upper-class university students do, he meets a student of Romance Languages named Jane Wilde (Felicity Jones), and the two young whippersnappers fall in love almost immediately. What follows is the story of their long, loving, frequently troubled relationship, through Dr. Hawking’s devastating struggle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (You know, ALS). You know, Lou Gehrig’s disease.

You know, the thing everyone was doing this for a few months back.

Admittedly, this movie was far from the movie I wanted to see most out of this year’s Best Picture nominees. I had heard good reviews, just not overwhelmingly positive ones, and I just thought it looked like one of those movies that are specifically crafted to rack up nominations by simply existing within the Academy’s wheelhouse (Recent examples include Philomena, The Artist and Everything that Meryl Streep Has So Much As a Goddamn Cameo in).

Also, I think I speak for many beleaguered high school students of the world when I say that physics can go fuck itself.

Just imagining it makes me want to start texting and put off studying.

Anyways, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t completely incorrect in that assumption as the film does, in fact hit many familiar beats, but it is executed in such a way that made me shrug my shoulders and say “Who really gives a crap?”. It’s not the most creative movie in the class of ’14, but I thought it was still a terrific movie that deserves all the recognition it can get. Unlike my next reviewed movie, which I would erase from everybody’s memory if I had the flashy pen-type things from Men in Black.

DO SOMETHING!!!

While the main reason that this movie works as well as it does is, as you may have guessed, the two leads, whose relationship actually came super close to making me shed man-tears, the other aspects of the movie are very well done, to boot. It’s very well directed, and the cinematography is downright gorgeous, to the point where it can kinda feel like they’re romanticizing a bit much, but I didn’t find it to be that much of a problem. The writing’s fine, and done in a way that actually made me understand more about physics than I did in three years of high school, even if it does wisely take a backseat to the relationship between Dr. Stephen and Jane (Those of you wanting to learn more about Dr. Hawking’s work would probably be better off going to a library. Or Wikipedia, whichever).

Also, the score, composed by Jóhann Jóhannsson of Iceland (A country whose musical output I’ve greatly respected since learning about Sigur Rós), is very beautiful, and quite memorable if you’re not an idiot like me who enjoys watching so much movies in such a short period so that all the soundtracks sound the same to you. Seriously though, it is beautiful.

While the lead actors do get a lot of deserved buzz for their performances, the very talented supporting cast also shines as well, with no real weak links among the bunch. Charlie Cox (Of Boardwalk Empire fame) is super-charming as a friend of the Hawking-Wilde family, which bodes well for his upcoming role as everyone’s favourite blind Marvel superhero).

Madame Web, Obviously.

I’ve watched this movie twice so far, and during neither viewing did I realize that the dude who plays Brian, Dr. Hawking’s college roommate, is the same guy (Harry Lloyd) who played Viserys Targaryen in Game of Thrones. I guess I didn’t recognize him without his sadism, creepy relationship with his sister or flowing platinum locks. Or it could’ve been the noticeable absence of liquid gold cascading over said platinum locks. Yeah, probably that. Anyways, he does a really solid job, as does David Thewlis as Hawking’s professor. Stephen Hawking himself makes a cameo as his own computerized voice and really disappears into his role in a way that nobody else could.

Obviously though, the actors that have really captured everybody’s attention are Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones, and as emotionally poignant and fantastic as Jones is, Redmayne’s is the one that truly stands heads and shoulders above damn near everybody else this year. I’m not just being my usual lazy self when I say that I can’t come up with a way to describe this performance (Although that is playing a part). You truly need to see it for yourself to know what I’m talking about.

So, for all my fanboying out over this movie, do I have any complaints with it? Well yeah, it’s not a perfect movie.

Now this… THIS is a perfect movie.

For instance, while the makeup and prosthetics team did a fantastic job with Eddie Redmayne to help him look the part of somebody with Lou Gehrig’s Disease, they really didn’t do that great a job of aging Felicity Jones to make her look like a fifty-year old by the end of the movie. I’m not bashing her performance by any means, and this doesn’t rate as a huge issue in my book, but it still took me out of the movie.

I guess it’s not like Felicity Jones can help the fact that she looks eighteen.

Also, this may just be a personal pet peeve of mine, but I am so fucking done with love triangles as a film trope, and there are two of them in this movie. TWO (This isn’t a spoiler, you see them coming from a mile away). I get that it’s what really happened, but I can only take much before it gets annoying. I suppose it’s handled well enough to cut out the “will-they, won’t-they” bullshit, but it still irks me quite a bit. I dunno, maybe the first season of Legend of Korra just left a bad taste in my mouth.

Overall: It’s more or less a conventional Oscar movie, but if you get as entranced by the emotional resonance of the movie as I was, you won’t give a damn.

Rating: 8.5/10

Next time on PKTM: I review Left Behind/contemplate agonizing forms of suicide.

Quote of the Day- January 29, 2014

So, because I haven’t yet learned not to trust myself with a deadline, I thought my Theory of Everything review would be out today. To tide all those of you still paying attention to me over, I give you one of my favourite quotes from one of the great philosophers of the modern age.

Everytime I see, like, an insanely hateful YouTube comment… I’m like, “Man, your time would really be better served making art.”

– Leigh Daniel “Danny Sexbang” Avidan

Look at him. Look at that sexy motherfucker.

The Imitation Game (Movie Review)

As homophobic a society as the UK was in the 40’s, the soldier on the right seems pretty into what he’s doing.

 Sorry that this review took me so long (Almost a month after The Imitation Game‘s wide release, to be exact), but I’ve been super busy with school, what with there being diplomas and midterms to write, and I had to take some time to write about the Oscar ballot, which was…Something else, to say the least.

For all the movies that got screwed over (Selma, The LEGO Movie, Nightcrawler), the Academy did do justice to some of the nominees, and one of the movies that got its just desserts is The Imitation Game, which ended up with eight nominations. Especially poignant considering both the new age in technology and the turning point in the LGBT rights movement that we’re currently experiencing right now.

As well as the equally influential “Cumberbitch” movement.

 The Imitation Game

 Directed by: Morten Tyldum

 Produced by: Nora Grossman, Ido Ostrowsky, Teddy Schwarzman

 Written by: Graham Moore

 Genre: Thriller, historical drama

 Based on: Alan Turing: The Enigma by Andrew Hodges

 Starring: Benedict Cumberbatch, Keira Knightley, Matthew Goode, Mark Strong,  Charles Dance, Allen Leech, Matthew Beard, Rory Kinnear

 Music by: Alexandre Desplat

Plot: World War II is in full swing, and, unfortunately, the good guys are kinda getting their asses kicked by the Nazis. Thanks to a highly sophisticated encryption code known as Enigma, the Germans are getting encrypted messages through to one another right under the Allies’ noses. Tired of the Nazis’ shit, the British recruit top scholars, mathematicians, linguists and such in order to try to break the cursed code. One of the mathematicians recruited by Her Majesty’s Secret Service Or Whatever is Alan Turing (Benedict Cumberbatch), a brilliant man, but also an arrogant, antisocial one, who has to juggle his service to the government with his closeted homosexuality.

“Big deal!” You might say. “Gay people get married all the time today! We love gay people! Why should he fear the government?”

You might say that. If you didn’t know that back in those days in Britain, homosexual activity could be punished with jail time or chemical castration. Not exactly the most accepting environment to Come Out to.

Does Turing and his team decipher the Enigma code? Does Turing’s homosexuality land him in deep trouble with the homophobic British government? WILL THE WORLD FALL UNDER THE THUMB OF HITLER AND HIS JACKBOOTED NAZI THUGS!??!

Spoiler alert. You know, in case you’re stupid.

I know you guys can’t tell, but I just typed 700 words after this point, and then pressed a button by accident and it’s all gone now. This is why I drink. And also why backups are a good idea.

I had a whole rant about how people don’t pay Alan Turing enough respect nowadays, and how instrumental he was in shaping modern society the way he did through his technology (Helping to beat the Nazis, forming the basis for computers and such), but no way I’m retyping it. Watch this movie, and do a little research, and gain a little appreciation for the tragic genius of Alan Turing. And hey, who better to portray the guy then the man who has entranced Sherlock fanboys and fangirls the world over with his charisma and voice of James Earl Jones proportions of awesomeness?

I have a natural disdain for fanbases who give themselves cutesy names in order to give themselves an identity (Maybe Beliebers have just left a bad taste in my mouth), but I’ll be damned if I’m not a Cumberbitch at this point. The dude’s an amazing actor, and his performance in this movie is absolutely no exception. In a lesser year, he would be the frontrunner for the category, but in a year where Michael Keaton decided to resurface solely for the purpose of putting every other actor in the world to shame, Benedizzle Cumber….bizzle will have to settle for a nomination. Wow, I will never put an “izzle” at the end of anybody else’s name ever again.

“I’m not mad, just dissa-okay, no, I’m actually pissed off. Never talk about me again.”

So, Cumberbatch is great. Whatever, you already knew/assumed that. How do all the other actors do? Well, really quite well, actually. Charles Dance is fantastic as a total dick (Although not a historically accurate one, apparently), which one would expect from Tywin Lannister. Matthew Goode and Mark Strong both do real well as Turing’s rival on the team and a MI6 officer, but the supporting cast member who seems to be generating the most buzz is Pirates of the Caribbean alumni and Phantom Menace survivor Keira Knightley, who was also nominated for the supporting actress Oscar. And she does okay. Not badly, to be sure, she does a good job, but compared to the complex, layered portrayal that her co-star, Cumberbatch gives a complex, layered character, Knightley’s just seems a little bit nondescript, especially for a character as interesting as Joan Clarke. That said, I can see the Oscar nomination. Maybe it’s just the Oscar’s hard-on for historical movies, or a sign of the lack of good female roles in movies that there was last year, but I don’t have a hard time swallowing her nomination. I still would’ve preferred to see Emily Blunt for Edge of Tomorrow, though.

For that matter…

For that matter, I can’t really name anything that this movie does poorly, per se. It’s very well directed, it’s extremely well-written and paced, it didn’t feel boring as many historical dramas tend to feel once you hit the one hour mark, and you definitely feel the tension of the mission that the codebreakers feel throughout the movie. I mean, I obviously knew that the Allies won the war at the end, but I was still on the edge of my seat, trying to figure out how exactly they mean to break the code, and the personal life of Alan Turing is one replete with drama and tragedy that will leave you broken-hearted if you have any semblance of a heart. Or whichever part of your brain regulates sadness. I guess anybody has a semblance of a heart, or they’d be dead. It’s four in the morning right now you guys, I’m so goddamn tired.

I guess the only real flaw  is that when you take the focus of the movie away from Cumberbatch (Which isn’t often, admittedly), it kind of becomes not so much the classic historical drama and LGBT Rights movie that it could become in the future and merely a very good movie. The supporting characters are just not that interesting when you take Turing out of the equation. Fortunately, it doesn’t happen often at all, and not enough to detract from this movie’s credentials as one of the best films of 2014.

Overall: A pretty freaking great movie about a really freaking influential human being, The Imitation Game is… Really good you guys? I dunno, it’s five in the morning, I’m going to bed.

Rating: 9/10

Johnny Depp isn’t the only one phoning it in this weekend!!!

Quote of the Day: January 22, 2015

So, I was about to publish my 1200-word Imitation Game review when, due to some technical issue with my keyboard that I have yet to rectify, I lost everything I had written in several hours’ work. After I had finished contemplating suicide, I decided I didn’t want to leave you guys without a post for almost a week (I spend most of the time writing down ideas and notes for posts and much less time actually executing), so I decided to leave you guys with a quote from a book I’m re-reading for the first time in several years, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Is this going to be a regular thing? Maybe. Am I going to follow through on that? Probably not.

“Often the less there is to justify a traditional custom, the harder it is to get rid of it.” 

-Mark Twain, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

Mark Twain: Legendary author, insightful satirist and world-class pimp.

The 5 Biggest Oscar Screw-Ups of This Year’s Nominations

Even the statues seem miffed about Jake Gyllenhaal getting snubbed.

The nominations for the 87th Academy Awards were announced early Thursday morning, and, merely a year removed from the pleasant surprises that were the nominations last year, I was feeling pretty positive about the Academy’s ability to make smart decisions about who they would nominate.

And then, this clusterfuck of a ballot surfaced. Ho-ly-shit.

I’m sure there must be other colossal mistakes that just aren’t coming to me, but these are the biggest blunders that come to my mind when I think of this year’s ballot. Let’s dive right in.

5. No Recognition for Voice or Motion Capture Performances

The Oscars: Once again proudly displaying their bias against black people, women and tiny Englishmen with whiteheads all over their faces.

Look Academy, I don’t expect too much forward progress from you guys when it comes to movies that aren’t entirely live-action. Hell, it took you guys until 2001 to actually make a Best Animated Film Category, seventy-four years after the release of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. I’ll get into the animated movies later, but using this logic, we can safely assume that it’ll be sixty-one years (Seventy four years after Gollum’s appearance in The Two Towers) before motion capture gets the respect it so rightfully deserves.

I’m not saying that you give Andy Serkis a nomination for Best Supporting actor, because a) Wasn’t he the lead actor in Dawn of the Planet of the Apes? And b) I have no idea how to compare motion capture performances to live-action performances. That said, shouldn’t voice and motion actos get some kind of recognition? “Best Actor Whose Face doesn’t Appear in the Movie?” Something like that, maybe!?

4. No Best Animated Film Nomination for The Lego Movie!?!?!?!?

See Oscars? Even Benny the 80’s astronaut thinks you’re out of touch.

Let’s get one thing out of the way: Despite everybody deeming The Lego Movie to be the movie to beat in this category, I did not want The Lego Movie to win this award. I wanted How to Train Your Dragon 2 to win this award. When How to Train Your Dragon 2 upset The Lego Movie at the Golden Globe Awards, I was ecstatic. So, in a sense, I’m happy that How to Train Your Dragon 2 now has less competition for the award.

That said, The Boxtrolls over The Lego Movie? Get a goddamn clue, will you Oscars? The Boxtrolls was fine, but it was no ParaNorman. The Lego Movie was earning consideration for a screenplay nomination.

Eh, at least that annoying song was nominated, so I can’t be too mad.

3. Selma…… Where are you Selmaaa……..

Sorry guys. We clearly have a ways to go yet. 

It’s so surprising to me that the power behind Selma (Oprah Winfrey, the American equivalent of Kim Jong-un) was unable to drum up a few more nominations for the movie, especially such an important, controversial one as Selma. I haven’t seen it yet (I plan to this weekend) but I have very high expectations, given everything that I’ve heard about it so far. The Oscars, being forward thinking as always, jumped at the chance to nominate David Oyelowo, who has been described by many to be the living embodiment of Dr. King.

Oh… He wasn’t nominated? Well, surely, the Academy jumped at the chance to nominate Ava DuVernay, the first black woman to be nominated for Best Director?

No? You’re gonna nominate the guy whose movie wasn’t even nominated for Best Picture?

…You people make me sick.

2. Lead Actor Shananigans

Yeah, I feel you, buddy.

This is just ridiculous. Jake Gyllenhaal and David Oyelowo being left off of the ballot is a damn disgrace. While I may end up eating my words when I do end up seeing Selma (I doubt it) I find it hard to believe that Steve Carell in a glorified Supporting Role (Admittedly, a great performance) or Bradley Cooper in his umpteenth consecutive nomination for a movie that is getting by on Clint Eastwood’s reputation, from what I’m hearing (I still need to see American Sniper) is topping somebody who has been called a present-day embodiment of one of the biggest heros this planet has ever seen.

And ditching Jake Gyllenhaal? Ridiculous. Fuck you, Academy. What the hell are you people thinking!?

1. Two “Best Picture” Slots Left Vacant

Look at that. Even the trophies don’t feel so good about this situation.

No, I don’t agree that accepting more movies dilutes the legitimacy of the ceremony. I think that even if a bad movie (Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, for example)gets in, it’s not very likely to go anywhere when Judgement Day arrives, and that’s what really matters in the end. So when I booted up my laptop, I was so disappointed when neither Nightcrawler nor Gone Girl nor Dawn of the Planet of the Apes were nominated.

I thought I was gonna end with me guns-a-blazing, spewing vitriol, but I’m just too sad, honestly. The nominations are actually fine, mostly, it’s just that all the nominations, with the exception of Best Actor and Best Animated Film, are the safe choices, and I was also really hoping that maybe they could make some history with Ava DuVernay… I guess I’m just disappointed. Mostly pissed off, though.

Despite my whining, I’m still going to watch the Oscars in February, and I still plan on reviewing all the Best Picture nominees that I haven’t reviewed yet (What else am I going to do? Watch The Wedding Ringer?). I should have my Imitation Game review out within the next couple of days, and if I get through those relatively quick, I may review a few more of the nominated movies. You know, if I feel like it. Also, I have something special coming up that involves Batman, so keep an eye out for that.

Oh..Dark Knight was a movie that got snubbed… I’m depressed again.

The Golden Raspberry Awards!!!

Oh boy, here we go…

Ugghh…. As is typical, the nominations for the infamous Golden Raspberry Awards (Or “Razzies”) were annnounced and, just like last year, it’s my duty to review these movies along with the Oscar nominees (Which are going to be announced on Thursday), culminating in my predictions on the night of the awards. This year’s “Worst Picture” nominees are:

  • Left Behind. My choice for worst movie of 2014. Not looking forward to watching this one again (As if I’m looking forward to any of them. My God). It’s one of two movies hell-bent on pushing a hardcore Christian agenda on its viewers. Did it work? Ha-ha. No.
  • The Legend of Hercules: Brett Ratner’s movie was better. This movie will never live that down.
  • Saving Christmas: This is the other religious movie I was talking about, as well as Kirk Cameron’s latest stop in his trip down the toilet bowl of irrelevancy.
  •  Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The only one of the nominees that I’ve already reviewed already. Thank God that’s out of the way.
  • Transformers: Age of Extinction: Left Behind’s only real competition for worst movie of the year (Although I haven’t seen Saving Christmas yet, so maybe it has a shot).

So, these movies are the ones that are definitely getting reviews, on top of the Oscar movies. Maybe I’ll watch another one of the movies nominated for other categories. Probably not though. These movies blow, you guys.

Top 10 Most Anticipated Movies of 2015

Godammit, do I ever love lists!!!

So, it’s that time of the year again. The time when we groggily emerge from our holiday hangovers and start getting back to the drudgery that constitutes our everyday lives, be it through working at a dead-end job, slaving away at school, or being a parent. The fact that, with January now here to stay for a bit, we don’t have much movies to escape to, doesn’t help either.

Unless you’re really looking forward to seeing Jennifer Lopez in The Boy Next Door.

But, tumultuous first months of the year aside, there are still a lot of movies to look forward to in 2015. The following are the ones that I’m looking forward to the most (And, by extension, the ones you should be looking forward to the most).  Just a heads-up, any movie that did not have some form of North American release in 2014 is not included on this list. With that out of the way…

10. Chappie

If the robot dies, I’m going to be a total fucking wreck.

Neill Blomkamp is one of the more promising sci-fi directors working today, having released the great apartheid commentary that was District 9, which ended up overcoming its August release date and sci-fi label en route to a Best Picture nomination, and Elysium, which… Was a comedown, for sure, but it wasn’t bad, despite Jodie Foster’s best efforts.

English? French? South African? Hell if I know.

 Chappie definitely looks to be a touch more… Spielbergian than his other movies, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing as long as it means that the movie ends up feeling more like E.T. and less like A.I. The movie is based on a short film directed by Blomkamp named Tetra Vaal, is written by Blomkamp and his wife, Terri Tatchell, and boasts an impressive, eclectic cast, comprising Wolverine, Ripley, Slumdog Millionaire, two members of the South African rave group Die Antwood, and frequent Blomkamp collaborator Sharlto Copley as the eponymous robot. It seems to have everything going for it so far. Here’s hoping District 9 wasn’t just a fluke. I, for one, have hope.

9. The Hunger Games: Mockingjay- Part 2

What? You expected Divergent?

A lot of people didn’t like the first Mockingjay movie. I am not one of them, although I did feel like it suffered from being split in half. Hopefully, all the tense build-up in the first movie leads up to something, because if it doesn’t, man is that ever going to make a lot of the pacing problems in the first movie less forgivable.

It’s probably gonna be better than Divergent 2 or whatever. At least we can all agree on that.

Fact: I’ve never read a book in the Divergent series, and I haven’t watched the first movie, so don’t mind my snarkiness, I’m just being a dick.

8. Jurassic World

The face of highly-intelligent, avian-descended, scientifically inaccurate terror.

This.

7. Spectre

 

“Now there’s a name to die for.”

Fun fact: The first James Bond movie I ever watched was Quantum of Solace. Yeah. Even then I knew that shit sucked. But then I watched Skyfall and Goldfinger, so I think that cancels it out, at least mostly.

So, why am I excited for this movie, despite not being a huge James Bond fan? Well, Christoph Waltz, mostly, but also Cristoph Waltz. However, one must not forget about Christoph Waltz, Christoph Waltz and Christoph Waltz. And don’t even get me started on Christoph Waltz.

6. The Peanuts Movie

Pleasebegoodpleasebegoodpleasebe goodpleasebegood…

Huh. Two Pixar movies coming out this year, and the animated movie I’m most looking forward to is a movie from Blue Sky Studios.

Need I say more?

I grew up with the comic strip and the old cartoons, so I really hope that this movie can do justice to Charles Schulz’s legacy, and the trailers were pretty awesome, contemporary pop song notwithstanding. Then again, the only good movie that Blue Sky Studios has ever made is Ice Age way the hell back in 2002, so forgive me if I’m still a little nervous.

5. Ant-Man

View image on Twitter

Pre-Guardians of the Galaxy “Ant-Man!? What the fuck. Marvel’s running out of ideas, this is fucking bullshit!!!” Post-Guardians: “Ant-Man? Seems legit.”

No Edgar Wright? No problem!

Okay, in all seriousness, the problems behind the production of Ant-Man are a little worrying, and the trailer wasn’t as mind-blowing as… Another one, but at this point, I think that Marvel’s earned the benefit of the doubt.

4. The Revenant

Combined Oscar wins: 0. Combined Oscar wins in a perfect world: All of them.

For my money, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s Birdman was the best movie of this past year. The same director with Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hardy doing his bidding? I’m getting manic just thinking about it, and we’re only at number four.

3. The Hateful Eight

I can already feel my bloodlust overwhelming me.

Quentin Tarantino is my favourite director and screenwriter, so if I was manic for The Revenant, you can bet your ass that I’m balls-to-the-wall insane with application for this movie.

2. Avengers: Age of Ultron

I’ve got no strings to hold me down… From seeing this movie!!! Play me off, Johnny!!!

You may have heard of it.

1. Star Wars: The Force Awakens

I know, shocking right?

Wow. It’s 2015, and we’re going to get a new Star Wars movie. Who’da thunk it?

With my luck, it’s going to end up even worse than the Phantom Menace.

St. Vincent (Movie Review)

Seen here: The physical representation of awesomeness.

So, because the Golden Globes are unclear on what exactly a comedy is, St. Vincent got nominated for Best Musical or Comedy instead of, say, Top Five, and I have to review it. Ah, well, once they nominate The Tourist, I suppose every other complaint looks nitpicky by comparison.

St. Vincent

Directed by: Theodore Melfi

Produced by: Fred Roos, Jenno Topping, Peter Chernin, Theodore Melfi

Written by: Theodore Melfi

Genres: Comedy, Drama

Starring: Bill Murray, Melissa McCarthy, Naomi Watts, Jaeden Lieberher

Music by: Theodore Shapiro

Plot: Oliver Bronstein (Jaeden Lieberher) is not having the best of times. His parents have separated, and he has had to move away with his mom (Melissa McCarthy) to Sheepshead Bay, New York, and tries to fit into his new school, always a tough thing to do for a kid. It’s no real cakewalk for his mom either, obviously, who is swamped with her job. So, to help lighten the workload, she hires her retiree neighbour, Vincent MacKenna (Bill Murray) to babysit him after school. Problem is, Vincent isn’t exactly the best example of a good role model for a 12-year old, being a drunken gambler who seems perpetually grouchy about something or other.

 I really wish I had more to say about St. Vincent, because it is a good movie, but aside from some very good performances from Bill Murray and Melissa McCarthy, it’s just that. Good. Not great. Not extraordinary in any way, and certainly not original. Just good.

I guess I should start out by complimenting the actors, who seem to be the focus of the majority of the praise directed at this movie, and it’s hard to see why not. The child actor is fine, and heads or tails above most child actors, but he’s not about to pull a Quvenzhané Wallis, as there were some slip-ups from him in the delivery of his lines, but that’s to be expected. You can’t really ask for much more from child actors.

Not every movie can have St. Macauley.

Bill Murray was ideal casting, and he plays his part perfectly in this movie, and I can totally see why he was nominated for the Golden Globe for Best Comedic Lead Actor, because he was just the embodiment of this cranky, cantankerous, yet sympathetic old man, even if, again, his character isn’t the most original. However, there is a point in the movie when his character undergoes a very drastic change that Murray performed excellently, and which may have ended up as one of his better performances.

Melissa McCarthy makes up for at least part of Tammy with a solid performance that was much, much more dramatic than one would expect from the lady who helped bring us Bridesmaids. Fine performance, but again, nothing particularly special, although it does give me hope that she can do better stuff than do her worst Will Ferrell impersonation for an hour and a half.

At least I had some semblance of an expectation for The Identity Thief.

Naomi Watts is fine as well, playing Vincent’s Russian prostitute buddy, but it was surprising to me that she got so much critical acclaim, even a nomination for a SAG award for Best Supporting Actress. That’s really stupid. I mean, she was good, yeah, but award-worthy? They couldn’t have maybe given it to Jessica Chastain? Carmen Ejogo?

Skeletor/Margaret Thatcher?

Also, I appreciate that the filmmakers decided against the tiresome trope of having Oliver’s Catholic school be the big baddie through all this. It’s not that I’m Catholic or even religious, it’s just that “Evil orthodox religious schools” are tied with “The government”, the “monolithic, evil corporation” and “environment-destroying, non-redeemable humans” as my least favourite clichéd movie villains.

 Murray’s performance is phenomenal, obviously, but the main beef I have with this movie is that we’ve seen this story before. It’s the black sheep with a heart of gold, of course he’s gonna meet up with a nice yet pitiful kid and teach him something about himself, and of course the little kid is gonna return the favour and get him to open up to human kindness. Even when what I thought would be an earth-shattering event in the story occurred, it didn’t, really. It just kind of kept moving forward in the auto piloted fashion it had started off on.

None of this is necessarily a bad thing, it’s just been done a million times before, and it’s been done much better. I dunno, it was a good movie, it’s not like I was expecting another Lost in Translation, but it also wasn’t particularly gripping or interesting for me. I can’t think of anything offhand that I disliked about the movie. I like the characters, I like the performances, it was funny when it needed to be, sad when it needed to be. It does everything right, just not particularly well enough to itself particularly memorable, especially among all the other awards contenders. It’s a solid, feel-good movie. Just not necessarily a special one.

Overall: Look, St. Vincent is a good movie. It’s just not a particularly original or exceptional one, apart from Bill Murray’s performance. Will I hold this movie close to my heart? No, but it’s a nice movie to put on if you just need a warm, fuzzy feeling in the cockles of your heart.

These are cockles, by the way. What a stupid expression.

Rating: 7/10