Thighs Wide Shut

Snowden
Villians, Heroes, Ones & Zeroes
Official Site | Trailer & Mo
R | 134 min

Edward Snowden and his story must be told, as many times as possible.  It has been told thru the news, endlessly, and then again, personally, in the vital doc Citizenfour, and now Oliver Stone takes his crack, and you’d think it would be all kinds of crackpot-ted, but it’s actually crackerjack!

In fact – Stone’s Snowden is his best film since 1995’s Nixon!  Woah, that’s a long-ass time ago, and yeah, he’s kinda made nuttin but crap since then (although I thighly recommend his TV show ‘The Untold History of the United States‘), but maybe Ollie needed to circle the wagons before he could find himself again – railing against the system, while telling a good story

When watching Stone’s post Nixon output, I kept saying to myself – these don’t feel or look like Oliver Stone films.  They look like sh!t and they feel like a$$.  Maybe Ollie’s done with the 60s and 70s, but we weren’t done with Ollie’s 60s and 70s, but Snowden shows that in the 10s, and with the 1s and 0s, he can make a modern Oliver Stone movie that works, and one that we can be at peace with… while it’s at war, with the world!

As for the movie? Joseph Gordon-Levitt IS Snowden.  If you’ve seen Citizenfour (and you should), you’ll think that G-Levitt nailed it as Snowden.  And Shailene Woodley as his love interest?  She makes things lovely, and interesting, adding well needed humanizing to Snowden’s story, which I didn’t really expect from Stone, or from a spy story that mainly involves keyboards and monitors!

And the rest of the cast?  Outside of Nicolas Cage‘s oddly restrained role as a burned out g-man, Melissa Leo (nice and quiet), Zachary Quinto (forever intense with those eyebrows), Tom Wilkinson (nice Scottish accent!), Scott Eastwood (so glad we’ll have someone that looks like Clint for decades to come), Timothy Olyphant (always a jerk), Ben Schnetzer (keep an eye on this guy), Keith Stanfield (another one to watch), and Rhys Ifans (always a prick, always amazing) all help to shine a much needed light on the darkness that lies behind keeping our enemies at bay

Plus, most people aint gonna see a documentary, so it’s important that thee fictionalized movie gets it right, cause more people will see it, and this movie gets it right, and more people need to see it!

Verdictgo: Breast In Show

Snowden snowDOES it right, currently at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

The Fault In Our Stars
Topic of Cancer
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
PG-13 | 125 min

Oh, how cute – two cancer kids making nice with each other, cause no one else wants to bother with them, besides their doctors, cautious parents, or friends… who also have/had cancer.  But there’s no fault in that in The Fault In Our Stars – the movie version made of the beloved novel by John Green, cause if you like two kids making nice, who are nice, regardless of their health – then you will like this movie

OK, so maybe one of them kids – Mr Perfect Ansel Elgort – is a little too perfect.  He’s TOOO charming.  He’s too sure of himself.  He’s TOOO positive.  And maybe even a bit too dreamy.  And what about the object of his affection Shailene Woodley?  Oh, man, is she such a lil good actress.  AND SHE EVEN MAKES HER OWN TOOTHPASTE – IN REAL LIFE!!!  But in Fault, she’s not making toothpaste – she making smiles, and tears and making heart strings tug – for herself and fo you

But even for a movie about kids with hardships – everything seems to come to them WAY too easy.  Oh, you want to go to Amsterdam to meet your favorite author ever, who’s now an angry drunk recluse (Willem Dafoe, with cool glasses)?  NO PROBLEM!  ALL YOUR DREAMS WILL COME TRUE!  How about falling in love in the least passionate place ever – Anne Frank’s House!  Sure, why not!  Love don’t holo-cost a thang!!!  Oh, you have trouble walking up steps cause your lungs have cancer?  No worries, we’ll put your bedroom in an attic so you have to climb stairs all the time!

But, but, but, but I don’t care.  I like cancerous him and I like cancerous her, and I like them together.  You will too  

And you will like their friend Nat Wolff – who was also in Palo Alto – which is fitting cause in that movie he was BFF with Val Kilmer’s son Jack, who looks like Ansel Elgort (sorta)

Verdictgo: Jeepers Worth A Peepers

Fault doubles up in theaters TODAY!

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

The Spectacular Now
Collapse Into Now
Official Website | Trailers & Mo 
R | 95 min

I wanted it, I got it… for the most part

What did I want?  More movies like The Perks of Being a Wallflower, which are movies more like John Hughes movies, you know, awesome teen movies from the 80s with heart and soul and humor!

What did I get?  Director James Ponsoldt + writers Scott Neustadter & Michael H. Weber (The 500 Days of Summer dudes)’s cinematic take on Tim Tharp’s novel The Spectacular Now

For the most part?  Ok, so you can’t call your movie Spectacular and be anything but, but Spectacular is not full-on spectacular, but the movie certainly has the elements to be, and is closer to it more than not, and is certainly closer to it than a majority of the garbage teenage movies handed to us over the past decade

So what is this movie?  It’s the story of a popular, funny-mouthy, easy-breezy, Big Gulp with liquor swilling kid named Sutter Keely (Miles Teller).  Sutter has no real direction, unless that direction is headed toward fun.  He’s recently single (not by choice, and of course no one would choose to ever be apart from Brie Larson), and one hungover morning wakes up on the lawn of socially clueless Aimee (Shailene Woodley), and the next week they’re sorta blossoming into item, much to everyone’s surprise, including their own.  She seriously gets into him, but he’s kinda loosy-goosy on her, but he’s that way about everything – like his part-time job at the haberdasher (his boss is Bob Odenkirk, cause why not?), dealing with his stressed-out mom (Jennifer Jason Leigh, cause why not?), and with his future (he’s soon to graduate, but college schmollege?).  Maybe what he needs is a dose of reality, from his poshed-up sister (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), or estranged drunken father (THE Kyle Chandler), or perhaps Aimee can smack some sense into him, and if she can’t, who can????

Where it all ends up isn’t exactly some well-drawn out conclusion, but heck, we fell for Sutter Keely and would follow his hit or miss-adventures wherever they did done do roam!  That Miles Teller as Sutter Keely, I tells yea, that performance feels so mad mad mad real (and kinda reminds us of ourselvesz at that age, hence the attraction), and Woodley’s Aimee – even more more more genuine (she’s quite a talent, and it’s a shame the fanboys hated her out of Spider-Man reboot 2), and their coupling – even more than faux real, it’s like five real/reel!!!  Can we be their third wheel, six reals?  Hmmm, maybe this affair was spectacular after all, just not now.  Maybe then?

Verdictgo: Jeepers Worth A Peepers

Spectacular is NOW today in NY & LA and elsewhere elsewhen

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

The Descendants
Hawaiian Punch Drunk Love
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 115 min

It’s an Alexander Payne movie, so cue the anger, the yelling and some yokel dolted side players, but it’s in Hawaii, so life’s a breeze, right??? It’s not (we mentioned it was an Al Payne movie, right?), and now it’s George Clooney‘s turn to play a Payned middle-aged moper (please lord, don’t give him an acting Oscar), and mope he mos certainly does at the bedside of his comatose wife, but he’s trying to keep up appearances for his two daughters (Shailene Woodley and Amara Miller) that he doesn’t really no how to care for, and then to make Alexander Payne movie matters worse, Clooney finds out that his wife was cheating on him with Matthew Lillard (we never forgot you!!) and he had no clue, and he’s now all kinds of conflicted (how can you be mad at a woman in a coma!!)!!  Feelings will be searched, bonds will be bonded, Hawaiian shirts will be worn and epiphanies will be reached, like how heritage sometimes trumps money!!  Plus we get to rock out to Hawaiian music with the likes of Rob Huebel, Beau Bridges, Robert Forster, Judy Greer and Michael Ontkean!!  Plus we get handed this really dumbed up kid (Nick Krause) who serves no real purpose besides being a punching bag for one scene, but his face should have been punched in every scene, but really,  he shouldn’t have been in a single scene.  So what happens?  Stuff and it’s fine and good and things and all, but it’s like a hang 7 instead of a 10

moral of the story:  think hanging a 7 instead of a 10 explains it all.  and Clooney schmooney, but Lillard is ill-yard, yo!

Never Change:

Verdictgo: Jeepers Worth A Peepers

The Descendants is currently breaking waves in limited release

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…