Five Minute Flicks

Eat Pray Love – www.eatpraylove-movie.net/

Cover via Amazon

The opening scene is a load of self-indulgent twaddle, but fortunately the film does pick up to the extent where the 2 hours 13 minutes it takes to follow Elizabeth Gilbert’s year-long journey of self discovery, doesn’t seem to drag.

The cinematography was spectacular and having been to all three of the films locations, (two of them on my own) I just wanted to book myself onto the next flight to Bali – but just for a holiday not a self-discovery journey. (You discover a lot about yourself when you move lock stock and barrel to a strange country far away from your family and friends and the places you love!).

 

I will be unpopular for this viewpoint (what’s new!), but It’s a shame she took a year to “find” herself, I could tell you exactly what was wrong with her in the first 3 minutes of the film. She was/is self-absorbed, spoilt, entitled and has commitment issues (so you didn’t like her Carol?). The concept of this film will be so alien to many women who don’t have the luxury or the funds to just take-off when life gets a little “challenging”; but I guess that’s the point, and the reason the book  became a best-seller and a film. The view-point, though not unique is aspirational. She makes it look like the easiest thing in the world to bugger off and hook up with all sorts of influential and life changing entities along the way. Of course being pretty and Julia Roberts does help in any language – and Julia Roberts just happens to look a lot like Elizabeth Gilbert

 

Actually I started to get a feeling of déjà -vu. Remember Shirley Valentine (1989) read this synopsis lifted directly from Ask.com.

“Overcome by the drudgery of everyday domestic life, housewife Shirley

Cover of Shirley Valentine

Valentine (Pauline Collins) wishes for a change of pace. When her best friend Jane (Alison Steadman) invites her on a free trip to Greece, she simply cannot refuse. After a few days of lounging on golden Mediterranean beaches, Shirley is back to her sprightly old self, and when she meets Costas Caldes (Tom Conti), the two engage in an unforgettable love affair which will change their lives forever.”

So “Eat Pray Love” is little more than an up to the minute more stylish and middle class version of Shirley Valentine, after all

 The hype was much more incredible than the film…

 

 

The Other Guys –  www.theotherguys–movie.com/

Starring Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg and neither as the stereotyped characters they normally play. In fact a complete role reversal, with the pair as a mismatched cop team. Mark Wahlberg is the loser and Will Ferrell the guy who woman fall-over for.

Loved it.

 

 

Scott Pilgrim versus the World – www.scottpilgrimthemovie.com/

Starring the latest twenty-something luvvie – Michael Cera (Juno; Youth in Revolt; Superbad)

Two reasons I went to see this movie:

Image by THX7168 via Flickr

1. It is set in Toronto
2. I like to get a look-see into my 18 year old’s world (sad I know)

I needn’t have bothered, apart from incredibly clever graphics and zany effects, I was bored witless and left early, and my son and his mate later informed me that it sucked and that Michael Cera was a douchebag…………

 

 

The Switch –  theswitch-movie.com/

I had really looked forward to this movie which was “touted” by critics in various papers as a Romcom with a twist that made it different.

It was entertaining for sure but I wasn’t blown away and it was predictable in every respect.

Jason Bateman looked good enough to eat, and was described in a hilarious scene  – featuring a homeless character with Tourette’s who standing at a crossing shouts out his vicious but accurate  “takes” on people he spots from his vantage point – as a “beady eyed looking little man boy”.

Jennifer Aniston played Jennifer Aniston again, and has probably put print blouses and V neck cropped pullovers back on the fashion map – she looked so good in everything the stylist threw at her. I’d just look as though I’d dressed out of the thrift shop in these sorts of clothes.

Not as good as a Love Happens with Aaron Eckhart but eons better than the Bounty Hunter with Gerard Butler

 

“Joan Rivers – A Piece of Work” – http://www.joanriversapieceofwork.com/

Image by Steve Rhodes via Flickr

“She’s kinda vulgar” said the Korean woman squeezing past me as I stood – bag over my shoulder, rubbish in one hand (like the good citizen I am) – in the cinema aisle watching the closing credit action.

And indeed she is. At 75 years old, Joan Rivers is not going to suddenly switch to doing age-appropriate comedy (whatever that might be) and even if you don’t like her potty-mouth brand of humour –  interesting that many in the audience were probably above the age of 65 and laughed raucously all the way through – you have to love her. As a side note, has anybody noticed how insidiously the generations above us have changed as the years have gone by. Case in point, watching the play “Hair” in Toronto a couple of years ago from a first row seat, I was unprepared for the facefuls of full frontal male nudity; yet all around me were packs of white and silver haired women, dressed to the nines, totally unfazed and loving every minute, because of course these were the flower-power generation!

 

This documentary which follows her around her life (literally) over the last year didn’t show a single peep of diva behavior. Even if it had been heavily edited, something of her “bitch” reputation would have shown through.

She is shown her plying her trade in all sorts of venues, and agonizing with writers and producers over whether she should include certain non-pc jokes (her politically correct filtering system is a little corroded), but she does strive  for shock value and to include as much controversial stuff as possible. Her view is that, if we couldn’t move on and use situations like 9/11 and the Aids (for instance)  era for humour – where the hell would we be? In one scene where she’s joking about a deaf person, she has to take on a member of the audience who yells out that she’s not funny cos he has a deaf son. Joan the performer’s counter argument to this heckler makes some kind of twisted sense; but the real Joan coming off stage is mortified to have caused the man pain.

The really telling part of the film is the insight into Joan’s neurosis about having a packed diary. She will take any job. The full diary is the evidence that she actually still exists, it has become the standard by which she measures her past, present and future worth.

So the documentary depicts what seems to be a naturally funny, warm and delightful woman with a self deprecating sense of personal awareness and an old-school work ethic that defies belief.

Yes she has had a mind-blowing number of plastic surgeries, but she does look amazing, and I guess that it is these interventions that keep her looking as fresh as 3am as she does at midday!

 

What a trooper

 

Check out the sumptuous penthouse – she describes the décor as what Marie Antoinette would have had if she’d had money!!

 

Respect

 

Over & Out

 

COMING UP 

Love Loss and What I Wore

Five go to Penetang