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…

Lucy
Mindless Over Matter
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 90 min

Fcuk Marvel and their brand of summer fun. If I had my pick, I’d let Luc Besson direct all my blockbuster blusters. Feels like 9ever since he directed ANY movie. I actually thought the last movie he directed was The Fifth Element. Apparently he’s directed 9 movies since then, and I saw 3 of them. One of those is his latest – Lucy – and it actually actually actually finally feels like the proper follow-up to Element, and more so to his BLAMMMMMAZIN Leo/The Professional. Sure, over the past decade+ he wrote & produced popcorn fluff like The Transporter & Taken flix, but he didn’t direct them. With Lucy, he directed the living fcuk out of it, and my eyes are thankful for it

While the movie is about the brain, it’s far from cerebral. It isn’t fully dumb, but it’s more dumb fun than it is intellectual property. But you wanna know what? I had more fun watching this summer flick than I did with any superhero and Michael Bay movie of recent memory. FYI – The only Michael Bay movie worth remembering is The Island, another smart dumb fun flick starring ScarJooo. FYI – LUC BESSON IS THE BEST (mostly)!!! PLEASE MAKE MORE WOMEN KICKING ASS STUFF THINGS!!!

Verdictgo: Jeepers MOS DEF Worth A Creepers

Lucy loos at a theater near you

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Chef
Burnt Sugar & Cheese
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 114 min

I guess Jon Favreau really loves food and cooking and wanted you to know this, by making a movie called Chef that’s basically about food and cooking, and the result is pretty lukewarm – SEND IT BACK TO THE KITCHEN!!!  Favry recruited a fun bunch to join him – Robert Downey Jr, Scarlett Johansson, Sofía Vergara, Dustin Hoffman, Oliver Platt, Bobby Cannavale, Amy Sedaris and John Leguizamo – but they have little to work with, other then being overly enthusiastic, in a movie that oozes more cheese than all the cheesteaks of the greater Philadelphia area.  There’s too much time dedicated to (showing us how Twitter works +) Chef Favry trying to bond with his onscreen kid Emjay Anthony, who has about as much acting chops as this movie has lamb chops – zero.  Look, I’m happy Favry is taking a break from big budget fiasco flicks, and going small, but this movie is tiny – a tiny bit entertaining, and a ton bit schmaltzy

Only bit I really really really liked was Oliver Platt playing a food critic, which is not much of a stretch since his brother Adam is the main food critic for New York mag.  The role wasn’t good at all, but I just like that he’s playing a role his brother does for a living

Verdictgo: Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badgers

Chef boy r deez nutz at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Under The Skin
Alien Ant Smarm
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 108 min

And the biggest piece of cinema sh!t of 2014 is Jonathan Glazer‘s Under The Skin.  MORE LIKE BLUNDER THE SKIN!!!   MORE LIKE UNWATCHABLE GARBAGE PACKAGED AS A MOVIE OF NOTHING!!!

OK, so there are some things, like seeing Scarlett Johansson‘s glorious curves, MULTIPLE TIMES [NSFW], but that’s about 8 minutes of glory, and 100 minutes of bore-y.  If it was 108 minutes of Scarlett’s boobs, then it’s a masterpiece, but it’s not, and everything else we’re shown is a crapsterpiece of sh!t

So why is this movie such a bucket of turds, showered in urine?  Oh, cause I said so.  Take my word for it, and don’t see this.  Unless you want to see nothing, with annoying music, and about 70 minutes of watching ScarHo driving a van and picking up random dudes and then taking them to some like abandoned house or something, and then get nekkid, and then the men get nekkid too and as they walk toward her, they like drown in a black pool of nothingness (THIS MOVIE IS A BLACK POOL OF NOTHINGNESS) or something, and then she goes out and gets in that van and does the same stuff all over again with some other unlucky blokes about town.  IS YOUR MIND BLOWN YET?  More like THIS BLOWS!!!!!  Eventually the cycle of man-trapping/drowning stops, and then JohanLett like runs in the forest, and then a lumberjack tries to have his way with her, but she can no longer deal and then she like throws her human skin away, and reveals that’s she’s a blackpool of nothingness of a being.  And STUFF!!!!  Oh, and there’s a guy on a motorcycle who like helps her or something, and I don’t give a flying fcuk

Intrigued?  Don’t be.  The trailer was fcuking awesome.  Pretend the movie is the trailer, and then move on with your life

OK, ok, so I will admit that Scarlett is awesome in this movie.  Probably her best work of this century that didn’t involve Woody Allen or juss her voice as Her.  But juss cause she’s awesome, and shows her boobs, which is REALLY awesome, does not eggcuse the rest of the movie that’s literally about as enjoyable as getting an MRI

OK, ok, so there’s one more aspect to the film that I liked.  In the movie, one of her mantrap-ees is a dude with Neurofibromatosis. Their interaction is equally as tender, as it is frightening.  And after not so much research, very real.  The dude with the messed-up face is 111111%real, and his name is Adam Pearson.  Kudos for being real.  Boo-dos to all the rest, which makes Upstream Color seem about as straightforward as an Air Bud movie

Verdictgo: Slit Your Eyes Out Repoopulous

Skin is un-deep in limited release

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Her
OS Oh Yes! 
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 119 min

Spike Jonze is so fcuking creative.  Maybe he needs lotsa time to be so fcuking creative.  And if so, is that why he’s only made four movies since 1999?  And if that so is so, so what?  If he’s gonna keep delivering mind-bending/blowing cinema, then please, take yer jolly a$$ time Spike!  His latest Her is just another grand notch on his ultra-cool, ultra-crazy filmmaking belt.  The difference with this flick vs his other works is that this one’s 111% the vision of Jonze, as he wrote the script from scratch himself

I for one am obsessed with technology.  I can’t keep my fingers off my phone (and my fiancee, but she doesn’t always do what I tell her to do :).  Jonze knows this (not about me, but about all of us), and he sees our relationships with our computers (in the near future) growing even closer, for worse AND for better.  His Her is a new computer operating system unlike anything that came before it, in our reality, and even in cinema’s fantasies.  Before Her, there was the artificial intelligence that was Metropolis‘ Maschinenmensch, 2001‘s HAL-9000, Tron‘s Master Control Program, WarGames‘ WOPR, and in body form, A.I.‘s David.  You can see what direction these movie AIs have been going – less evil, more human-like, more helpful, and more lovable (yet always creepy!!).  Woah, Spike, you just unknowingly made a sci-fi epic, without being at all sci-fi-y!

Joaquin Phoenix is our end user Theodore Twombly, a lonely, thoughtful and misunderstood soul looking for someone to talk to, and to fill the void of his recently lost love life.  When he purchased his new operating system, simply named OS1, little did he know that he was about to embark on another rollercoaster of love and all that comes with it.  OS1, with the voice of Scarlett Johansson, gives herself the name Samantha, and Theodore a new lease on life.  She grows as a learning computer, and he grows closer to ‘her’ with every byte, and they ultimately and completely fall in love with one another.  But can a man fall in love with his computer?  Well, in 2009, a man married a video game character, so why couldn’t this happen?  The love in Her feels true, but remains so unnervingly creepy to us (there’s a scene that cuts to moments of black, which will make you feel beyond awkward), but in this near future landscape, it’s more acceptable than it is frowned upon

Do we want this bad good bad future to happen?  To be honest, I don’t want anything in Spike Jonze’ head to become real, but I want to keep on seeing what he sees, cause only he could make a make-up-less Amy Adams seem sexier than she did being half-naked in American Hustle

Verdictgo: Breast In Show

Clothing Jonzeing: now you can dress like it’s the near future too, with Opening Ceremony’s Her inspired line!

Her boots up currently at a theater near jews

(this was the last movie we needed to see before coming up with our best of ’13 list. sorry Phil O Meana & Nebraska, there juss aint time to see you)

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…