hiatus

The Casual Watcher would like to casually announce that due to sickness, a toxic workload and trauma due to the sister's reality-show addiction (For Love or Money with a new twist!), the site has been on hiatus for the past three weeks and will be back to regular blogging by the end of the month.

Pumpkin | How Correct is Politically-Correct?

A bottle-blond Christina Ricci is playing consummate W.A.S.P. and cheery sorority girl Carolyn McDuffy who falls in love with a mentally- and physically-challenged boy, Pumpkin Romanoff, played by Hank Harris. The initial premise won’t really catch your fancy. However, Pumpkin, the movie, seems to hook you with a degree of dark satire and an outrageous, not-so-politically-correct treatment that is at times hilarious and at times a hitting statement on so-called politically correct behavior.

The root of all the hoopla is a competition among the Greek-letter sororities for Sorority of the Year. Carolyn’s sorority, Alpha Omega Phi, is sponsoring a team for the Challenged Games, so that each sorority sister is assigned a challenged person to coach. She is teamed up with Pumpkin, whom she initially disdains, but eventually she falls in love with him because he “sees into her soul,” having to choose between the retarded-er-challenged boy and her tennis champ-campus king boyfriend Kent.

Christina Ricci has made a living out of playing quirky characters and this one is no exception. She parodies the got-it-all-together blonde campus queens (maybe a take on Elle Woods) and gives her performance a little oomph. Marisa Coughlan plays the focused sorority president who does everything and anything in her power to win Sorority of the Year—missed her since that promising yet ill-fated Wasteland. Brenda Blethyn, quite a talented actress, is a bit underused as Pumpkin’s protective alcoholic mother, who can’t make heads or tails of her son growing up and actually maturing (“you’re not retarded… you’re special… we’re sure, we had you tested!”).

Honestly, you might not know what to make of this movie—if it’s a black comedy, a parody, or a romantic comedy. There are flashes of brilliant satire, and then there are some seemingly ill-placed bouts with saccharin that don’t really just fit in. It seems like the director wanted to make it all of these, but the totality wasn’t all that seamless. It does have its moments, though, and it stretches the boundaries of so-called taste. Favorite moments included a West Side Story-like face-off and the fuss about Alpha Omega Phi’s Asian member.

Pumpkin pokes fun at the pretentiousness of supposed politically-correct organizations, in how the sorority deals with the “inappropriate” relationship of Carolyn and Pumpkin, one of their own, and one of their charity cases. This is not a movie that I would watch over; and in fact it could have been shortened a little bit. However, it did elicit wry smiles and the occasional laugh—not a total waste.

Neither hilarious nor serious, but borderline scathing. Rightly so that this movie was viewed on cable.

The Stepford Wives | Almost Camp, Almost Satire, Almost Funny

It seems that there is some sense to the satirical, almost campy, approach that the Frank Oz and Paul Rudnick have taken with the remake of the 1975 cult classic The Stepford Wives. From the Ira Levin novel released in 1972 to the screen adaptation in 1975 and several TV-movies, the term “Stepford wife” has infiltrated popular culture; yet its moment seems to be over. Truly, in the 1970s, men would have had something more objectionable to say about feminism and being a “career bitch” (which is what Nicole Kidman’s character Joanna Eberhart has always wanted to become since she was a young girl), but today, it would indeed seem the best way to tackle a storyline such as this is with farcical rather than sinister elements.

Kidman stars as Joanna, a network president who gets sacked after her feminist-leaning reality shows reap tragic results. After Joanna suffers a nervous breakdown, her husband Walter (played by the always pleasant-faced Matthew Broderick) transplants the family to Stepford, Connecticut, where there is no crime and “no pushing”. Joanna tries to fit in with the always-genial, eternally dressed-up and coiffed women of Stepford, seeking solace among fellow new residents Bobbie Markowitz (expertly played by the talented Miss M, Bette Midler) and gay “wife” Roger Bannister (Broadway regular Roger Bart). The three seeming misfits get together to speculate on the goings-on in town, including Sarah Sunderson (country singer Faith Hill) having an apparent seizure. Glenn Close and Christopher Walken round out the cast as premier Stepford couple Claire and Mike Wellington.

As time goes by, Walter gets deeper into the Stepford men’s club inner circle, while Joanna tries to assimilate and be chirpy. However, when Roger Bannister (apparently staunchly Democratic), becomes a gay Republican who dresses in Brooks Brothers, and Bobbie Markowitz, the dreadful slob who once wrote a book entitled “I Love You, But Please Die” for her mother, becomes a blonde Betty Crocker fanatic, Joanna confirms that something is amiss. The audience, though, has known that for quite some time.

The talented cast gamely churns out good performances (Kidman and Midler’s comedic turns, Close’s steely effervescence, and Walken’s menacing evenness are the most noteworthy) but it seems there is something that prevents the story from actually taking off, preventing the film from totally engrossing the viewer. This shouldn’t be the case because this is a fresh take on a classic; yet it seems the snappy one-liners, pop culture references and great pacing and comic timing still, somehow, fall flat. Even the twist at the end of the tale doesn’t hook you.

It was a good decision to watch this only when there was nothing else to watch. It has its moments, but you can flip back to those from time to time if ever you’re watching on cable. Mind you, though, Nicole Kidman looks absolutely delightful as a Stepford wife. Delish.

The Notebook | Into Each Life, Some Mush Must Come

Ah, love. Bane of our existence, yet it could be the very thing that keeps us alive. The Notebook is yet another love story, harkening to a world where things are more straightforward, where a boy from the wrong side of the tracks could woo a girl from the “right side” over the course of a summer and she would fall in love with him; where parents could be villainous and prevent their daughters from seeing certain unsuitable people; and, most importantly, where true love could prevail.

The Notebook is a faithful rendition of the poignant Nicholas Sparks bestseller, which dealt with first love, lost love and the debilitation of Alzheimer’s disease in a slim volume. Noah Calhoun and Allie Hamilton come from different sides of the track. They meet during an idyllic summer filled with the exuberance of youth and the first stirrings of passion. Rich girl, poor (albeit literary-inclined) boy—this situation inevitably leads to parental displeasure. Separation, intercepted letters, and a world war later, Allie is engaged to be married to prize catch Lon Hammond, who, like Noah, is a war veteran but is from old money. Circumstance brings the former lovers to each other’s periphery and Allie has to make a choice between two men, either of whom could be the love of her life. Meanwhile, in the present time, Duke is reading to an older Allie from a notebook: Allie is suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, and there are only a few lucid moments when she is herself again.

The Notebook is a good-looking story. The lighting is almost always perfect, and Ryan Gosling (young Noah), Rachel McAdams (young Allie) and James Marsden (Lon) are a beautiful set of people. Even the older Noah and Allie, portrayed by veteran actors James Garner and Gena Rowlands are nicely shot and impeccably dressed—perhaps partly due to the fact that Rowlands is director Nick Cassavetes’ mother. Previous Nicholas Sparks adaptations Message in a Bottle and A Walk to Remember were also prettily done. Therein lies the beef. Sparks stories, and particularly, Sparks leading men, seem quite prettily perfect. Admittedly they have a character flaw or two but this ends up to be quite endearing. In the case of Noah Calhoun, his character is written so compositely unsullied that any mistakes that he might make are easily acceptable and, in fact, make him more endearing. Unfortunately for real girls, there seem to be very few, if any, real men, who would actually be like Noah Calhoun. And they would most probably be taken. Or gay.

As always, old hands Garner, Rowlands, and Joan Allen, give solid performances; but it is especially noteworthy that Gosling is getting more range as an actor, actually portraying a “normal” person in this film, rather than the troubled, psychotic youths he had previously portrayed in movies such as Murder by Numbers and The United States of Leland.

Admittedly, director Cassavetes pulls out all the emotional stops in this tear-jerker. The plot is simple just like the book, moving back and forth between present-day Duke reading from the notebook interspersed with flashbacks to Noah and Allie falling in love and then losing each other. There is nothing earth-shaking, but rather something comforting, about simple love stories such as The Notebook, because, beneath layers of cynicism and world-weariness, the joy of love—be it the innocence of first love, or the strength of everlasting love—still does make us smile. Never mind if you’ll never meet anyone remotely like Noah Calhoun.

Weepy date movie. Better watched with girlfriends, with a lot of popcorn and sighing.

shiny, happy

Channel-surfing yielded shiny, happy stuff:

On Studio23, The Swan featured extreme changes on this contestant named Cindy, who went from looking like a witch with a hook nose to looking like… a regular Filipina. Great.

On National Geographic, the topic was asteroids. I am always entranced by those big shiny things in the sky—I think it’s an offshoot of my not being interested in people but in bigger things. I’m continually reminded that I’m a speck of dust in an infinite universe.

On AXN, Brad Pitt in The Devil’s Own. I remember watching this in college in a packed cinema. I think it was one of my first exposures to the hunka burnin’ love that is Jennifer Aniston’s hubby. It’s like, Brad just has to smile, and the world is a better place.

Okay snap out of it.

On HBO, Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. The battle of Helm’s Deep, and the Ents’ attack on Isengard, in particular. Sigh. Would that we could battle modern-day orcs (corrupt politicians and their henchmen?) and evil could be defeated by burning a Ring…

Connie and Carla : Variations on a Well-Trodden Comedic Scheme

Connie and Carla is Nia Vardalos’s take on Some Like It Hot, with a girl-power twist. Vardalos’ Connie and Toni Collette’s Carla are childhood friends and aspiring dinner-theater performers who witness a mob hit (hmm, Sister Act, anyone?). Carla screams, “Drive, Thelma, drive!” in a different nod to another well-loved film, and on the run now, they head towards Los Angeles, which Vardalos derides as having no dinner theater and no culture (apparently a widely accepted derision regarding the City of Angels). They end up pretending to be gay men in drag (defer to the great Julie Andrews in Victor/Victoria) and wowing audiences at The Handlebar after its main drag act leaves for Vegas.

Connie and Carla elicits a few good laughs, basically because Nia Vardalos is quite a witty writer, but her best work to date is still My Big Fat Greek Wedding. Everything she did and will do after that movie, like this film, will find the comparison difficult. Many things about the movie have to be taken at face value because not much of it is logical or makes sense, unlike the comparatively seamless (although haphazard) logic of My Big… However, if you get it behind you that Vardalos and Collette could never be mistaken for drag queens, the movie gets quite interesting—the musical scenes are especially entertaining. It is noteworthy, though, that the movie tackles some relevant issues such as body image (not that Toni Collette could ever be considered fat) and acceptance of alternative lifestyles (hence the subplot about a drag queen’s straight brother accepting his gay brother and his cross-dressing). Vardalos could have used a little more research on her drag queen information, as some of the representations bordered on the stereotypical.

Vardalos can still be cute, but we have seen this act before, in My Big Fat Greek Wedding, in an acting job to which it was obvious she gave more commitment. Toni Collette, meanwhile, seems to be giving Vardalos acting lessons, even if Vardalos seemed dead-set on being the star of the show. The seasoned actress is a joy to watch, going from lovesick girlfriend to woman of substance through the course of the movie. Sad to say, it seems that her and David (still-can-be-disarmingly-cute) Duchovny’s talents were not fully utilized in the movie. Vardalos and Duchovny’s chemistry as Connie and Jeff (in a series of meet-cutes) wasn’t particularly great, yet somehow the movie works because the actors seem to all be so enthusiastic about it. (Vardalos, meanwhile, could get some pointers from another comedic screenwriter and actress about writing a great script but staying in the background: Tina Fey, with Mean Girls.)

Stephen Spinella as Robert/Peaches, Jeff’s cross-dressing brother, gives a balanced comedic performance with a hint of poignancy. Boris McGiver, as Tibor, the Russian gangster out to get Connie and Carla, provides an excellent subplot with his effective transformation into a showtunes/dinner theater fan. Meanwhile, Filipinos in particular have to watch out for Alec Mapa playing Lee/N’Cream, one of the drag queens. Parts involving Mapa (one time he shouts out, “Hoy!”) elicited a great deal of laughter from the Filipino audience.

All in all, Connie and Carla was a run of the mill but rightly funny film, not a movie that you would seek out, but a good choice for an evening out with the friends. The fact that you watched it all together makes it worth the ticket price at Power Plant. Otherwise, this would be worth Glorietta 1, at least.

Anticipation

Movies to watch out for:
Wimbledon - Paul Bettany is a skidding tennis player and Kirsten Dunst plays a tennis golden girl. Set amidst the traditional and well-loved Wimbledon courts and tournament.

Without a Paddle - Seth “love-pa-rin-kita-Oz” Green and Matthew “Shaggy” Lillard on a sometimes distasteful but funny camping trip-cum-journey of discovery.

I Heart Huckabees - Jude Law and Naomi Watts lead a wonderful ensemble ironing out existential issues, including Dustin Hoffman, Lily Tomlin, Isabelle Huppert, Jason Schwartzman and Mark Wahlberg. Tippi Hedren and Shania Twain have cameos.

Vanity Fair - Reese Witherspoon plays Becky Sharp in the film adaptation of Thackeray’s classic novel, supported by such notables as Jim Broadbent, Bob Hoskins, and Natasha Little (who played Becky in a miniseries adaptation of Vanity Fair a few years back). To watch out for are Rhys Ifans in a serious turn far removed from his usual buffoonery and Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, who is just, plain and simple, nice to watch. Teehee.

Oprah | Studio23 | Aug. 24, 2004

On Oprah last night: Traci Lords

In an episode focusing on the bondage and molestation of women (the second part dealt with cult communities that espouse polygamy and child brides), Oprah interviewed former porn queen Traci Lords. Growing up in a household with three male cousins renting the room next door, it was inevitable that I would hear the name of the most famous porn star of that era in snippets of conversation, that were hushed immediately when underage ears when in the vicinity.

Lords has come out with an autobiography entitled Underneath It All, chronicling her abusive childhood, her foray into nude photography at fourteen which the blessing (pimping) of her mother’s boyfriend, her running away and beginning in the porn business at 15. During her interview she also spoke about hitting rock bottom, being questioned by the FBI, and eventually picking up the shards of her life, seriously taking up acting and landing guest roles in various TV series and movies.

I first encountered Traci Lords as a series regular in Profiler. She played Sharon Lesher, the homicidal accomplice of serial killer Jack, archnemesis of the main character, profiler Sam Waters, played by Ally Walker. I was drawn to that steely look, and the sheer nakedness with which she portrayed the troubled Sharon. Apparently, she had a lot of life experience on which to base that characterization.

I admire that Oprah puts topics such as abuse on the forefront on her show without appearing crass or exploitative. There is always a great degree of taste and compassion when it comes to the exploration of sensitive topics such as these on the show.

Meanwhile, I was also glad that Lords was able to come across as a very intelligent person; and a recovery from the depths of abuse that she went through was optimistically portrayed as being possible, and necessary. Traci Lords is doing something positive by serving as a role model. The best part of her interview was when she explained why she didn’t change her name, stating that she wanted to face up to her past and not make excuses about it. This woman rocks.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

We start Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind tritely, yet brutally, enough: the narrator says that he believes that Valentine’s Day “is a holiday invented by greeting card companies to make people feel like crap.” For the majority who has at any point in time been loveless on Valentine’s Day, that strikes an all-too-familiar chord, without being grossly sentimental or over-acting. Jim Carrey not over-acting? You have to see it to believe it.

The movie moves on sweetly, if not innocuously, enough—Joel Barish (a restrained Jim Carrey) gets a sudden urge to go to this god-forsaken place called Montauk on a wintry Valentine’s morning. There he meets a strange woman with blue hair, Clementine, who is the perfect wild-child foil to his brooding reserve. It is strange, though, that Joel has never heard of the song “O My Darling Clementine”. Cut to Joel, in the car, crying his heart out. Charlie Kaufman writes a delightfully strange love story in the vein of “Somewhere Down The Road,” but with brain damage.

Apparently Joel and Clementine have met before, they have become lovers and their relationship died a bitter death. Joel finds out, after seeing Clem with another man, that she has had him erased from her memory at Lacuna, Inc., a company that offers the service. Vengeful, he goes to Lacuna and decides to do the same. In what is like a strange trip, Joel’s mind gets erased one memory at a time, in backward chronological order. However, in the middle of the procedure, Joel decides that he does want to keep some memories of Clem, and a weird but suspenseful pursuit follows as the Lacuna technicians try to follow the memory of Clementine even as Joel hides her in his deepest darkest memories. The story loops back around itself, but eventually unravels, much to our delight.

This race to keep Clementine’s memory alive, as well as the goings-on behind the scenes with Tom Wilkinson’s groundbreaking doctor, technicians Mark Ruffalo and Elijah Wood, and Kirsten Dunst as the receptionist who has a strange fondness for Bartlett’s quotations about memory, including the one from which the movie derives its title, from Alexander Pope’s Eloisa to Abelard: “How happy is the blameless vestal's lot!/The world forgetting, by the world forgot./Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind!/Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd.” Aside from the basic love story of the leads, the intricate goings-on among the Lacuna staff are also integral to the movie.

Kaufman and director Michel Gondry (the uber-video director) weave their magic in a movie which is strange science fiction; but when all’s said and done, it is at its heart a quirkily human love story. Jim Carrey is effective in his restrained performance, quite a mean feat for the known over-actor. Kate Winslet is constantly proving herself to be a steady actress far more versatile than she could have been stereotyped for after Titanic. The supporting cast, especially Ruffalo and Wood—far removed from Hobbiton—give strong performances, even the doctor’s wife in her short scene.

There are other little details that add to the effectiveness of the story: references to the dining dead, insightful comments from the characters, Joel’s forgetting even Huckleberry Hound, a childhood staple, because of his song “O My Darling Clementine”. Carrey’s comic side finally gets some release in the scenes where he is trying to hide Clementine’s memory in the deepest darkest recesses of his brain, acting out as a four-year-old and as a horny teenager. The memory couple’s awareness that they are being erased provides an added element to the urgency of the pursuit through Joel’s head. Kaufman’s masterful script and Gondry’s visual manipulations combine to make a movie that is earmarked for the MTV generation but can charm even the older crop.

Dunst’s Mary says, “Adults are like this mess of sadness and phobias.” How true. A lot of traumatic experiences, not a few involving heartbreak, leave indelible marks on our lives. How marvelous it must be to be able to start anew, on a clean slate. This leaves us to ponder, though, will knowing what happens in the past prevent people from making the same mistakes in the future? Some people, perhaps, are just destined to repeat their mistakes for sheer obstinacy—and maybe human nature. The whole process of painful memories surfacing once in a while is, after all, cathartic.

Some people say that this movie did not make sense. In fact, most of the time, love doesn’t make sense either. Most of the time falling in love or falling out of love is not the sensible thing to do; but it happens. What is important is it was done. And if memories are purged, as if that love never happened, it can’t seem that we will be the better for that, because that is part of what makes us what we are.

50 First Dates

I must admit, Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore have that certain onscreen chemistry that makes their flirting and falling in love a joy to watch, be it in The Wedding Singer or here in 50 First Dates.

I am watching 50 First Dates more than a few months after it came out. At the time that it was showing I said that I didn't want to watch it because (a) I had just watched Finding Nemo and one character with short-term memory loss was enough for me at the time; and (b) I had no date to watch this, one of the best date movies there is. There, I said it. One of the best.

I know quite a number of people will disagree. First of all, the plot is quite contrived. Barrymore's Lucy, bonked in the head in an unfortunate car accident, is caught in a loop that makes her relive the day of the accident over and over, much like Groundhog Day. However, unlike Groundhog Day and that X-Files episode where Mulder and Scully get killed, it won't stop when the "right thing" happens, because the whole world is changing around her. In a strange move, her father and brother (a buff yet lisping Sean Astin) decide to keep her at home and pretend that everyday is October 13; putting together birthday cake and a little party.

That is, until Sandler's Henry Roth, noted wooer of female tourists, comes into the picture. He is taken with her pancake houses and, of course, the fact that she is as pretty as Drew Barrymore. The former commitment-phobic Henry now dedicates his life practically, first to flirting with Lucy, and then, later, to helping her deal with her condition. Sometimes a little tough love is needed, indeed.

This is a happy-sad film--it will exercise your lachrymal glands, but elicit a soft smile at the end of the picture. It is sheer unadulterated mush, but with happy bursts of energy, especially from a good supporting cast including Sandler's bud Rob Schneider (with his usual over-the-top antics), Dan Aykroyd as Lucy's head doctor (I think this was supposed to be a cameo), the strangely androgynous Lucia Strus as Henry's ocean park assistant, Amy Hill, Rakishi look-alike Pomaka'i Brown, constant comedic support Blake Clark, and a variety of sea creatures who actually steal some scenes. Sean Astin's turn as Lucy's lisping, steroid-using brother is also quite comical, and it seems he was able to shed the Sam-weight quite well.

50 First Dates is a wonderful morsel of a movie that would have been worth Greenbelt4. It might not be a Great Picture, but it's one definitely worth seeing once, and maybe once over in a few years' time.

In hindsight: Is it a coincidence that Lucy's father is named Marlin? As in the father of Nemo? Strange movies with short-term memory loss.