Hail, Caesar!
What The Hail???
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
PG-13 | 106 min

You sit there watching the Coen Bros‘ Hail, Caesar!, and you think to yourself – this is cool – they love old Hollywood, I love old Hollywood, they’re totally doing right by old Hollywood, and as the movie snappily moves along, you start to realize that nothing is really going on, and you’ve laughed MAYBE twice during this comedy, and by the time that Joel & Ethan’s name appear on screen to kick off the end credits, you start to question what in the film is there to actually hail?

It seems like the Coen Bros invested more time on casting, or OVER-casting (Josh Brolin, George Clooney, Alden Ehrenreich, Ralph Fiennes, Jonah Hill, Scarlett Johansson, Frances McDormand, Tilda Swinton, Channing Tatum, Alison Pill, Christopher Lambert, Fred Melamed, Patrick Fischler, David Krumholtz, Fisher Stevens, Alex Karpovsky, Clancy Brown, Robert Picardo, Dolph Lundgren and Michael Gambon‘s voice), than they did trying to construct a fluid movie.  They have ideas – WAY too many of them - and they’d maybe work if they were short films, but together as one long film – it’s juss a bunch of loving valentines with no heart

What I don’t REALLY understand, like I also didn’t REALLY understand with Inside Llewyn Davis, is if this stuff is based on real–life stuff, then why do the Coen Bros bother to fictionalize it into fluff?  They would be better off actually making a movie about the real players, instead of trying to impress us with their impressions.  It’s a waste of their talents, and a waste of our time

I mean, they obviously put a lot of thought into the movie, but I juss didn’t think too much of it.  Less is more.  They needed less of most of it, and more Alden Ehrenreich.  He gets a hail + the sets + Josh Brolin’s tuff gruff + the double dip of Tilda Swinton

Trumbo captured a similar time and themes in Hollywood, but it lacked the professional polish the Coen Bros gave Caesar.  Maybe the Coen Bros should have made Trumbo, instead of trying to make a movie that makes you feel like a sad trombone after watching it

Hail YEAH!!: it’s been awhile since we highlighted some movie hotties.  so here’s two that need hailing!!!

Natasha Bassett

&

Emily Beecham

Verdictgo: Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badgers

Caesar is a mixed salad today at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

The Revenant
Useless S. Grunt
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 156 min

How do you like your Leonardo DiCaprio?

Bearded?

Frozen?

Speaking in Injun talk AND in grunts?

Drooling?

Raped?

well, you get ALL these Leos in Alejandro G. Iñárritu‘s latest zero funfest, that’s more endurance test, than enjoyable movie going  

Yes, welcome to The Revenevavnaveananenanenenananat!!!!!!!!!!!

YES, the backgrounds are beyond beautiful, and the injuns are cool and creepy, and YES, the story is kinda sorta true (which ALWAYS makes a movie instantly more interesting)

but NO to everything else

I mean, the fur trapping and wading in water was kinda cool at the beginning, but that all ends and it pretty much becomes the Tom Hardy is a giant a$$hole show, and you can barely understand what he says, even less than when he was Bane, and he’s being chased by Leo, who is tyring to be less understandable.  So it’s like a revenge pic, an endlessly mumbling one, and you juss keep waiting and waiting for the revenge, and zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

YES, the beards and snow are wicked cool, but NO thanks to the rest

I mean, I guess if one good thing comes out of the pain and snoring – Leo will finally gets his elusive gold man

Verdictgo: for the scenery only - Jeepers Somewhat Worth A Peepers. for the snoozyery, meeeeeeeehh - Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badgers

The Revenant revs its engine and frozen beards at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Carol
Shopgirl Meets World
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 118 min

Love me some Todd Haynes.  Love how he can make a movie look like an Edward Hopper painting.  He obviously tries to do that time and time again, and I applaud him, and he’s so good at doing it, and cause Edward Hopper is my favorite artist ever, and he should be yours too.  The thing that makes Edward Hopper’s paintings so incredible, and unforgettable – is the sense of quiet, loneliness, and emptiness.  Unfortunately, for Haynes’ latest – Carol – it feels a lot too empty

Carol is based on the The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith.  Highsmith is no stranger to Hollywood – having many of her works adapted for the big screen – and with great artistic and cinematic success – notably Hitchcock’s Strangers On A Train (one of my all time favs) and Anthony Minghella’s The Talented Mr. Ripley (one of the late 90s best movies).  Most of her books deal with homosexuality, either overtly, or subtly.  I wouldn’t know for sure, since I don’t know how to read, but take my word for it – she loves the gay stuff

Carol is about two women – one young and naive, and the other older, jaded and about to be divorced – and how they cross paths and hearts, and touch boobs.  The younger one is Rooney Mara, and the elder one is Cate Blanchett.  Blanchett does her thing – that elegant socialite thing I feel like she can do in her sleep.  She’s kinda like the woman she was in that Woody Allen movie, but maybe a little more together, and a lot more 1950s looking.  Mara does her Rooney thing, which is to stare blankly into space with those cold blue eyes, and make those Disney’s Ichabod Crane faces she makes (and looks exactly like in general)

I don’t get Rooney Mara.  I mean, she knows how to act (they don’t show her flubbing her lines), but I don’t get her.  She’s not really that attractive (not important, but kinda is – these are women we talking about), or even all that amazing of an actress.  I wonder what her sister Kate thinks.  She’s like – step off b!tch – I’ve been acting since 1997, and you, only since 2005, and you got an Oscar nom, and I got to be in that Fantastic Four remake no one saw.  Well, in Carol, Rooney’s like the main character, and she’s mainly blaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh and blank and zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.  The movie kinda is too.  IT ALL LOOKS SOOOO FCUKING AMAZING (to look at), but feels very empty, too empty, so empty, empty like a pocket – like the emptiest empty of all time. There are screen emotions going on – and we want these two ladies to make it work – but the emotions are left onscreen, and never transferred themselves to me.  You want a love story that will tear you apart?  Watch Love Story.  If you want a bore story, watch Carol

If only Carol were a painting, and hung in a museum – where it belongs – then it would be a masterpiece.  As a movie – it’s an Edward Hopper painting that’s not much of a movie – a ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZsterpiece

Verdictgo: Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badgers

Carol leZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZies it up in limited release tomorrow

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Spectre
Bland, James Bland
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
PG-13 | 148 min

I’m digging the origin digging going on in these Daniel Craig James Bond flicks.  Sadly, I’m not fully digging on all of the films.  With the 4 Craig flicks – it’s been GREAT! (Casino Royale), then BLAH! (Quantum of Whatever), then HECK YEAH! (Skyfall), and now – with Spectre – it’s like ZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

A total snoozefest!!!!!!!!!!

All I remember is like Bond driving a car in Rome or something, and seducing Monica Bellucci in all of 5 seconds and then she’s gone from the movie, and then Bond goes to some snowy place, and then he goes to another snowy place and then like wants to help Léa Seydoux cause she’s hot, and then they have to go to Tangiers or something and then there’s a mouse, and a hidden room, and then they go to the desert and cross paths with Christoph Waltz as a nehru jacketed doctor of evil [spoiler alert]

and then?  I dunno – some kinda conclusion that’s not conclusive, or interesting

I like the rebooting of the Bond character – but it’s time to hit the reboot button again.  Maybe they should try to go ultra-cheesy and do a throwback to the Roger Moore days.  Why not even do a Bond period piece?  Or Bond as a ninja??  Everyone loves ninjas.  Or Bond orbiting Uranus????

Verdictgo: Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badger

Spectre is not so spectre-tacular at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Fifty Shades of Grey
Fifty Shades of Meh
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 125 min

I have zero clue if EL James‘ book Fifty Shades of Grey is any good, but I know the movie based on her book isn’t very good.  Sure, the movie has endless amounts of Dakota Johnson‘s butt and boobs and a lil bit of vag, and yet it’s all udderly dull.  Lots of teasing… and wooden acting… and contract negotiations.  Negotiations haven’t been this blah since Sio Bibble opened his trap.  Apparently this Grey sh!t started off as Twilight fan faction, and if it wanted to be any bit interesting (well, it kinda is a little bit interesting – I mean, Dakota is kinda nice to look at), it should add some vampire baseball, or at least show Jamie Dornan‘s junk, or at least do some sorta of EL James / EL Fudge crossover

Verdictgo: Zero Merit AND No Stinkin Badgers

Grey is meh at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…