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| THE BAXTER |
| 08.01.05 (11:06 am) [edit] |
THE BAXTER
Starring: Michael Showalter, Elizabeth Banks, Justin Theroux, Zak Orth, Peter Dinklage, and Michelle Williams
Directed by: Michael Showalter
Written by: Michael Showalter
reviewed by GABRIEL SHANKS
Michael Showalter, the director/writer/star of the retro romance THE BAXTER, has a sweet face, gentle nature, and slightly spooked stare that, in better moments, reminds one of a distracted Jimmy Stewart. Perhaps this is why he seems so natural (or obvious) a choice to make a postmodern swipe at the romantic comedies of the 1940's, an era where men fell neatly into categories (leading men, or everyone else). There's an allure to going back to, if not an earlier era, at least an earlier system of moral values...a time when a hardworking, well-meaning guy might still get the pretty girl.
Sadly, however, Jimmy Stewart's magnetic bravado is nowhere to be found in Showalter's lifeless, affected dead end. THE BAXTER purports to champion the little guy, the one left at the altar when Monty Clift or Brando or Sinatra sweeps into the church at the last minute at steals the girl away. But what THE BAXTER really does is show exactly why guys who get left at the altar often deserve their fate. It argues, ironically, for the case that pretty people should only end up with pretty people, and the best that the rest of us can do is hope that the temp with bad hair will find us equally nerd-hot. (Only the dapper and mesmerizing Justin Theroux, as the designated Bride-Stealer, makes an impression that lasts beyond the final credits.)
Showalter has developed something of a cult following through his work with comedy troupes Stella and The State, and he's proven a gifted film comedian in Wet Hot American Summer. But THE BAXTER is bound to please only those interested in his sketch-comedy roots. Implausible dialogue and predictable plotting...well, let's just say that Jimmy Stewart rarely had to fight those beasts. In the end, feel sorry for THE BAXTER...like the film around him, he's a spirited but shallow disappointment.
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| THE BROTHERS GRIMM |
| 08.01.05 (10:42 am) [edit] |
THE BROTHERS GRIMM
Starring: Matt Damon, Heath Ledger, Jonathan Pryce, Lena Headey, Peter Stormare, and Monica Belucci
Directed by: Terry Gilliam
Written by: Ehren Kruger
Reviewed by GABRIEL SHANKS
Bombastic, whimsical, and delicious, The Brothers Grimm evokes all of the adjectives one comes to expect about the work of director Terry Gilliam. Like Twelve Monkeys, it's weird. Like Time Bandits, it's fanciful and just a bit dark. Like Brazil, it's more than a bit offbeat; and like all of his work with Monty Python, it is most certainly original.
But this latest film of Gilliam's also bears the imprimatur of its Hollywood-bred screenwriter, Ehren Kruger, the horror wild child behind Scream 3 and The Ring. An odd-duck pairing, their collaboration tempers Gilliam's imaginative tangents with Kruger's mainstream sensibilities, meshing together idiosyncratic elements with an almost fiendish devotion to narrative. Entertaining and clever and only rarely off-putting, this hybrid is fantastical but familiar, definitely weird but not uncomfortable...a Harry Potter experience for those who have outgrown the fantasy cliches of boy wizards. The Brothers Grimm -- which is only tangentially about the authors of the famous Anglo-Saxon fairy tales -- is really a comic ghost story wrapped in the postmodern folds of Shakespeare In Love, where the characters could be our contemporaries if it weren't for the period dress and bad hairstyles.
In Gilliam and Kruger's world, the Grimm brothers Wilhelm (Matt Damon) and Jacob (Heath Ledger) are theatrical hucksters who drum up fake witches in rural German villages, and then exorcise those demons...for a fee. Their lives are filled with wine, women and stories; Jacob, in particular, is consumed with the folk tales of his childhood. Wilhelm, however, fancies himself a realist...that is, until the two encounter the forest of Marbaden, where little girls in red riding hoods and those dropping bread crumbs are disappearing in droves.
The central mystery rapidly becomes the focus of the Grimms' adventure, including a tug of war over a village tomboy, Angelika (Lena Headey) and a vain, aging sorceress (Monica Belucci). There's little in the way of subtlety, in either the drama or the comedy. At moments, the film careens over the edge of believability in a cartoony, broadly drawn style. Especially in the first half-hour, The Brothers Grimm struggles to find its footing, bungling comic moments and wasting opportunities to fill out its central characters.
But as the film continues, Ledger finds an amiable rhythm in Jacob's literary nebbishness, and soon after Damon balances his hammy portrayal with more textured colorings. Like the Grimm tales themselves, the film is alternatively frightening and barbaric, and probably a tough fit for Miramax, who can't really sell it to children. The onscreen violence lands somewhere just shy of Lord of the Rings, but the storytellers treat the violence with less deference than the hobbits did. The Brothers Grimm is probably best for adults who still have a kid inside them somewhere, people with a worldly understanding of the modern-day equivalents of witches and werewolves. Imperfect but eminently enjoyable.
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Welcome to Mixed Reviews Single Servings. Here you'll find short reviews of current and past movies for people too busy to read a full review.
You can find full-length reviews of present and past films, from Hollywood releases to independent films to "hidden treasures" that haven't been released yet, at our main site, Mixed Reviews. Please browse our archive for links to reviews of films dating back to 1998.
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