Thighs Wide Shut

Darkest Hour
Puff, Puff, Pass
Official Site | Trailers & Mo
PG-13 | 125 min

How do you like your war movies?  Things that go boom?  Or do you prefer endless talking, in a cloud of endless cigar smoke?  If you prefer the latter, then STEP RIGHT UP to Joe Wright‘s Darkest Hour, which can certainly talk the endless talk, but the movie has zero WALK.  OK, that’s not true – there’s a LOT of walking.  If the Winston Churchill of this movie had a Fitbit on his wrist, he would be so proud by the amount of steps taken by the end of the film 

But would the real Churchill be proud of the performance that Gary Oldman attempts?  LARGE SHOES (and not juss cause Winnie’s overweight), and Oldman can always go larger than life (or shoes), but I didn’t buy it at all.  The whole time watching, me like – is that what Winston Churchill was like?  Some dude in terrible make-up, who’s prone to overracting in order to get Gary his 2nd ever Academy Award nomination???? No thanks  

Also, in this war movie – WHERE’S THE WAR?????  What went on in Dunkirk gets a mention, and when it does, me like – man, I wish I could juss watch Dunkirk instead of this!!! 

Lost in all the blubbery make-up (and the really dumb and cheesy secretary character played by Lily James) are two things I really liked – learning what happened to Neville Chamberlain (a scared looking Ronald Pickup) after he stepped aside for Churchill, and seeing what a restrained Ben Mendelsohn looks like.  He plays King George VI, without much of a stammer, but I loved the performance.  A better acting exercise woulda been to scarp this movie and juss remake The King’s Speech, but with Mendelsohn stuttering instead of Colin Firth.  I mean, they made two Capote movies, and both were great!  They could have named the Mendelsohn one – Gawd Save The Qqqqqqqueeen

Verdictgo: Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badgers

Darkest Hour clocks in today in limited release

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Hanna
Mum Lola Mum
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
PG-13 | 111 min

A beautiful and sheltered girl with lightening quick reflexes and an un-licensed license to kill is set loose upon the world to kick some major a$$, with the beyond sweet sounds of the Chemical Brothers following her every move.  Is this our wet dreams come true… or the so-so movie Joe Wright churned out… of his league.  Wright has made one good movie (Pride & Prejudice), one third of a great movie (Atonement) and one that had all the right instruments and band members, but couldn’t eggzactly make a hit song (The Soloist… in retrospect, wethinks our review was a lil too favorable).  Credit to Joe Dubs for tackling something a little bit more fun, and not even necessarily all that dumb, but Hanna is juss another one of his middle of the pack finishing unfinished bidnesses

How could this be?  The movie looks and feels cool, and lil Saoirse Ronan as our titular babe in the woods with the goods is totally a wicked fit (with the bonus of papa Eric Bana as her Mr Qui-Gon Miyagi), but nothing here seems to click or add up to anything worth blagging home about.  It’s not action-y enuff to be an action flick, and its attempts at humor are about as humorous as twelve episodes of Lopez Tonight.  So what is this sorta messy mrs doubt misfire?  A revenge picture with no anger or sense of danger?  An un-professional Professional? A Domino that falls?  Run Lola Run, but running in place? Dogtooth with no bark or bite? Salt that aint kosher? The Boys From Brazil with no balls/zeal? And why all the terrible German accents? Did Tom Hollander do all of his dialect research by watching Sprockets and Udo Kier‘s oeuvre?  Was Udo Kier not available??? And what’s with Cate Blanchett‘s uuuugh-inducing Texas twang?  She’s one sneer away from entering Kathy Batesing it WAY overboardland!!

The only relief comes in the form of a vacationing British family that Hanna latches onto.  Parents Jason Flemyng and Olivia Williams are a good match for each other, her and us, and we were totally digging the vibe of Hanna’s new BFF (Jessica Barden), an OMG WTF bubblegum babbling chav-tastic tween, but all this surrogate sidetracking belongs in a separate movie.  Hactually, most of the fragmented proceedings stitched together here deserve their own individual treatment.  Focus people, focus!!

Remember how TRON 2 worked mostly cause it was one giant Daft Punk video?  Well, Hanna‘s like a 6th rate Chemical Bros vid.  What, was Michel Gondry not available either?  Perhaps he was getting busy with Udo Kier??  UDO KIER!!!!

Caption This!!!:

‘Your Royal Highness, this is that girl who gets raped in that Peter Jackson movie everyone hated, but it really wasn’t that bad of a movie.  Swears!’‘

Verdictgo: it’s passable entertainment, but it could been a contender, so Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badges

Hanna has no sisters at a theater near jews tomorrow

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…