Goliath, Dog. Go!

17. Apr, 2009 0 Comments

Every Little Step
Plural Singular Sensations
Trailers & Mo | Official Website

A Chorus Line is a famous musical. You may have heard of it. One day it didn’t eggist. Then the day after that one day, a dancer/choreographer/writer named Michael Bennett got a bunch of his Broadway dancer friends to talk candidly about them things they all does to make it on The Great White Way, and from hours upon hours of recorded tapes of those sessions + the marvelous music of Marvin Hamlisch, bam, presto, pocus hocus, pocahontas, A CHORUS LINE was borne identity! The self-reflexive show about 17 dancers auditioning to be in a… chorus line was a smash hit in 1976, winning 9 Tonys, and is still the fourth longest-running show on Broadway. It was revived in 2006 and Every Little Step takes us on a rare look behind the curtains at the pre-production process from soup to nuts [please note that we hate the phrase ‘soup to nuts’, but we also hate the word ‘duke’ and we have to use that word every now and again]. You think that that American Idol sh&t is breakhearting? Try watching month after month as actual gifted performers try their damnedest to land a role in a musical about a bunch of performers trying their damnedest to land a role in a musical! We I feel like I’m in an MC Escher drawing after reading that last sentence 3 times!!! This captivating doc makes you never want to be an actor with a dream. It also makes you want to be an actor with a dream. It also makes you/we/me want to go and see A Chorus Line, or at least think about renting the Lord Richard Attenborough/Michael Douglas movie that is supposedly ‘fatally halfhearted‘. You’re not allowed to choose until you choose to see Every Little Step, although we completely understand if you’d rather wait and fulfill your Step movie quota with Step-Up 3-D

Greatest Original Name of A Song Mt EVERest: ‘Dance: Ten; Looks: Three‘ started life being called ‘Tits & Ass’ [SFW]. these aren’t [NSFW]

Verdictgo: Jeepers Mos Def Worth A Peepers

Lemon Tree (Etz Limon)
Justice Is A Blind Lemon Jefferson
Trailers & Mo | Official Website

Salma Zidane (Hiam Abbass, in a quiet, beautiful performance, also seen in The Visitor) is not the mother of the animated gif head-butting superstar of 2006’s World Cup, but a Palestinian woman who clings to her one and only reason for being: her family’s guns lemon tree grove. Then one day the Israeli Defense Minister (Doron Tavory) and his totally wicked hot middle-aged Jewish wife (Rona Lipaz-Michael) move in next door. Hilarity doesn’t ensue. The IDM’s secret service suggest that his new backyard neighbor’s trees are a threat to national security and should be chopped down. He easily agrees with their thinking and thus begins a legal David vs Goliath battle between the lemon drop girl and the your land is our land government head. Dem be almos fighting words are exchanged, lemons are thrown, kisses are had (involving sandy dreamboat Ali Suliman, who you should czech out in the brilliant Paradise Now), and all are as bitter as Renee Zellweger’s Extreme Sour Lemon Candy. Based off a true story, Lemon Tree tackles a mighty big topic in a small, and well mannered way. The message isn’t rammed down our throats, but a message is made nonetheless, and some messages are less than none, but this message is way more than less and wayer more than none, so come on heads, feel the lemons!

Pop Culture: one of our mos flavorite defunct sodas is Israel’s Kinley Lemon. the Coca-Cola brand wethinks no longer eggsists, or has become a Fanta flavor. last time we had it was in 1994, although it appears that it’s still served at Epcot Center’s Club Cool

Verdictgo: Jeepers Worth A Peepers

American Violet
A Pre-Racial Procedural
Trailers & Mo | Official Website

Tim (the grand nephew of Walt) Disney‘s American Violet is another real life legal David vs Goliath battle, with the action taking place in a small Texas town, and the crime isn’t owning a lemon tree, but a single mother of four wrongly accused of being a drug dealer. We know she’s innocent, cause if she were guilty, no one would probably pay to see this. Our unlucky heroine Dee (plucky newcomer Nicole Beharie) has two choices: plead guilty, which is what the local law folks want her to do cause
they is angry whites peoples (like district attorney Michael O’Keefe, who’s no Georgia peach), or do the impossible by fighting the charges against her, which would keep her away from her kids and hinder the chances of her keeping custody of them, and away from her hothead ex (Xzibit, who is exhibit A when it comes to rappers who should have never become actors). The ACLU comes to town (led by Tim Blake Nelson and Malcolm Barrett) and with the help of a reluctant local lawyer (Will Patton, who’s been blossoming in a post-Kevin Costner career more than Kevin Costner has) they convince Dee to fight the system! The rest plays out like a predictable TV movie of the week (whatever happened to those? like the hammazin awfulness that was 1988’s Crash Course, starring Alyssa Milano, Olivia d’Abo, Tina Yothers AND JackÃ©e!!!!), but it’s winning enuff stuff to be seen in a theater