Tag Archives: Tina Fey

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Get In, Losers

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Mean Girls

by George Wolf

Some of us find the idea of reliving high school during this social media age to be downright horrifying.

Mean Girls takes us there, throwing in enough songs, sass and relatable humor to make the trip entertaining. Still horrifying, but entertaining.

And speaking of social media, word is I need to stress again that there are songs – this is an adaptation of the Mean Girls musical, and not a remake of the 2004 film.

Those songs, from Jeff Richmond and Mark Benjamin, are woven pretty seamlessly into the larger-than-life drama of high school by co-directors Samantha Jaye and Arturo Perez, Jr. Tina Fey adds some new sensibilities to her updated script, but keeps the core tale of “queen bees and wannabes” instantly familiar.

Cady (Angourie Rice from The Nice Guys and Beguiled) goes from home schooling in Kenya to being the new girl at North Shore High in Illinois. Shown some lunchtime pity by Janis (Moana‘s Auli’i Cravalho) and Damian (Jaquel Spivey in an impressive debut), Cady agrees to infiltrate the “plastics” clique of the evil Regina George (Reneé Rapp) and her sycophants Gretchen (Bebe Wood) and Karen (Avantika).

But, of course, Cady falls for Regina’s ex Aaron Samuels (Christopher Briney), and finds herself caught in the lure of burn books, backstabbing and cutthroat social climbing.

It’s all a fertile playground for sudden bursts of song and dance, though the musical set pieces often betray the directors’ extensive TV background and come off feeling a bit constricted. Not every song here is a “banger,” but the vocal talents of the cast – especially Cravalho and Rapp – help tunes like “Meet the Plastics” and “I’d Rather Be Me” make an impression, while the clever wordplay in “Stupid With Love” and “Sexy” stir up infectious fun.

And just wait ’til you hear what song Damian has chosen for the talent show.

This young cast is loaded with talent, Fey and Tim Meadows make reliably solid reprisals, and Busy Phillips brings some mischievous self-awareness to her turn as Regina’s overly chummy mom. If there’s a weak spot here, it’s the under use of the always funny Jon Hamm, who gets a glorified drive-by as the requisite coach teaching sex education.

Does this musical adaptation re-imagine its original film with as much meaning as the new Color Purple? No, it does not. But this Mean Girls brings a new zest that keeps the fetching from feeling like fan service, and enough generational upkeep to forge common ground between longtime graduates and a new class of fans.

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Spirits in the Material World

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A Haunting in Venice

by Hope Madden and George Wolf

If we’re going to congratulate Rian Johnson for reviving the murder mystery, save a backslap for Kenneth Branagh. His Murder on the Orient Express came two years before 2019’s Knives Out, and though Branagh may be adapting decades-old Agatha Christie classics, he’s proven adept at giving them a stylish and star-studded new sheen.

Branagh also stars again as Hercule Poirot, the legendary Belgian detective who showed a friskier side (probably thanks to Johnson’s sublime Benoit Blanc character) in last year’s Death on the Nile. Now for the third in their mystery series, Branagh and screenwriter Michael Green embrace the season with a gorgeous and frequently engaging update of Christie’s 1969 novel “Halloween Party.”

It is 1947, when the now-retired and war weary Poirot meets up with his old friend Ariadne Oliver (Tina Fey) in Venice. Oliver is a famous writer who considers herself quite the smarty, but she needs Poirot’s help to debunk the work of Mrs. Reynolds (Michelle Yeoh), a medium whose talks with the dead are pretty damn convincing.

The setting is a Gothic manor with a disturbing past, where Poirot agrees to attend a seance on Halloween night. There, after a children’s party, Mrs. Reynolds will attempt to give Rowena Drake (Kelly Reilly) the answers she seeks about the murder of her daughter, Alicia (Rowan Robinson).

But another murder soon steals the show, with even Poirot himself questioning his own eyes as things in the night go plenty bumpy.

Branagh again teams with cinematographer Haris Zambarloukos (Belfast, Death on the Nile), enveloping the film in a haunted house vibe that is wonderfully foreboding. The camera explores the confines of the manor via angles that are often extreme and disorienting, while lingering on cloaks, masks and other various other articles of creep.

Poirot is a changed man since last we met. He’s seen too much evil, and believes in “no God, no ghosts,” as a cloud of trauma and grief that fits the film’s mood hangs over him. Branagh and his stellar ensemble (including Jamie Dornan, Camille Cottin and Belfast‘s Jude Hill) work their character edges well, making sure no one is ever quite above suspicion.

And those suspicions are easier to play with when the source material isn’t as well known. But while revamping a deeper cut is welcome, the chance for creepy surprise does come at a price.

The core mystery just isn’t as compelling. Branagh and Green make alterations that prolong the chill factor, but result in moments that seem more like a Christie disguise than the face of the master herself.

A Haunting in Venice‘s lingering impression is as a slice of well-dressed fun. It’s a Spooky Season movie for those who don’t like things too scary, and an Agatha Christie tale for those who’d rather not think so hard.

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Moore Than a Woman

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Maggie Moore(s)

by George Wolf

Maggie Moore(s) is nestled in a quiet little neighborhood between the Coen Brothers, Taylor Sheridan, and any mid-lfe rom-com. Expect engaging characters getting caught in dangerous games and possible romances, and reacting with clever witticisms, charming flirtatiousness and occasional bursts of violence.

And though the film doesn’t rise to the best of any genre, it patches together enough winning moments for a worthwhile caper-com.

With an opening declaration that “some” of the events actually happened, Paul Bernbaum’s first script since 2007’s Next takes us to a small desert town in Arizona that’s suddenly rocked by two murders in one week.

And both victims are named Maggie Moore. WTF?

Is there a connection between Maggie 1 (Louisa Krause) and Maggie 2 (Mary Holland)?

That’s what Police Chief Sanders (Jon Hamm) and deputy Reddy (Nick Mohammed) aim to find out. And pretty soon they’re finding out that Maggie 2’s husband (Christopher Denham) has a girlfriend (Bobbi Kitten) and a life insurance payout coming, while Maggie 1’s man (Micah Stock) has been passing photos for a pedophile food supplier (Derek Basco) in exchange for cheap and moldy cold cuts for his sub shop.

Oh, and Maggie 1’s neighbor Rita (Tina Fey) says the couple’s fights had recently been escalating.

Director John Slattery (God’s Pocket) exhibits fine juggling skills, giving his Mad Men pal Hamm plenty of room to craft Chief Sanders as the easy-to-root-for heart of the film. He’s a widower who takes a creative writing class at night, and his rebuff of a classmate’s overtures only makes us more hopeful when he and the divorced Rita find reasons to meet.

Of course, it helps that Hamm and Fey are real life buddies, with enough natural chemistry and snappy barbs (Him: “Wash your car.” Her: “Wash your ass!”) to make their time together a treat to watch.

Yes, putting a wannabe romance in the middle of Hell or High Fargo can bring a disjointed feel, but the orbit of distinct characters and cutting dialogue around it never lets the crime-solving grow tiresome.

Don’t look to Maggie Moore(s) for trail blazing or ground breaking, it will come up short. But for an hour-and-a-half of breezy, sometimes messy entertainment, it’s plenty capable.

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Harold and Awed

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For Madmen Only

by Matt Weiner

E. B. White warned us years ago against explaining a joke when he wrote that “Humor can be dissected, as a frog can, but the thing dies in the process and the innards are discouraging to any but the pure scientific mind.”

What then to make of For Madmen Only, a feature-length explanation of not just a joke but a unique art form created by a man who has to hold the title of greatest comedy legend that nobody has ever heard of?

Well, nobody outside of the comedy world. For Madmen Only seeks to correct this by documenting the story of Del Close, the improv comedy guru who brought form and structure to the genre and influenced decades of comedians, from Bill Murray and John Belushi to Tina Fey and Amy Poehler.

Director Heather Ross brings an ordered, mostly chronological approach to Close’s chaotic life, with a who’s who of talking heads to back up the thesis that Close forever changed the direction of modern comedy. Ross balances the interviews with a series of re-enactments, with James Urbaniak giving such an uncanny performance as Close that he deserves a feature-length companion.

For Madmen Only turns the history of a comedic form into a fully engaging suspense tale, that centers Close as a dogged Quixote trying to prove both the artistic and financial success of improv, even as his tumultuous lifestyle leads to setback after setback (and a few mental breakdowns for good measure).

The film also manages to walk the tightrope between hagiography and documentary. If improv performance attracts a special blend of weirdo – as the on-camera interviews persuasively argue – that might go double for audiences who regularly watch these risky performances and hold detailed opinions about their favorite UCB Harold teams.

Yet for a documentary on such a niche subject, Ross (along with co-writer Adam Samuel Goldman) hangs everything on a universal frame. Close is an artist first, and his medium just happened to be a new kind of sketch comedy. While a film dedicated to bringing Close to a wider audience is naturally in his camp, Ross sprinkles in enough counterpoints for anyone who thinks two hours of improvised comedy is too unstructured to be funny.

Where this treatment of Close does pull its punches is when it comes to any in-depth look at the very narrow type of diversity this comedy scene fostered, an issue the industry is still grappling with. But at least that gets a passing mention.

Completely absent is any look at the financial situation these theaters have created for participants. (A situation that has, not coincidentally, led to a comedy landscape where relatively privileged writers and actors can afford to pay large amounts of money to the theaters in big cities while paying their dues.) But these blind spots belong to the entire industry, not just Close.

In a fitting nod to improv, For Madmen Only is full of surprising detours and poignant observations. It would have been easy to reduce Close to tortured genius or entitled bully. It’s harder to embrace vulnerability and grapple with the answer: “Yes. And…”

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All That Jazz

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Soul

by George Wolf

Pete Docter has written, directed, or been a part of the story team for some of Pixar’s greatest achievements. From Up to Inside Out, WALL-E to Toy Story, he’s helped set the standard that each new Pixar film competes with.

For Soul, Docter and co-writer/co-director Kemp Powers sense the time is right to tweak the winning formula a bit, creating a deceptively simple, beautifully constructed ode to happiness.

The updated blueprint starts with an African-American lead, Joe (voiced by Jamie Foxx), a middle-aged music teacher who still harbors dreams of stardom in a jazz combo. Just when Joe gets that long-awaited chance to play with one of his favorite artists, an out-of-body experience finds him fighting to get back to the life he’d been living.

Hence, the “soul” here may be not what you’re expecting. The music is all that jazz, but once Joe meets up with a wandering infant soul named 22 (Tina Fey), the film becomes a funny, surprising and truly touching journey toward becoming a fulfilled human being.

And what a beautiful, big screen-begging journey it is. Soul looks like no Pixar film before it, with wonderfully layered and personality-laden animation for Joe’s daily life that morphs into an apt Picasso vibe for our time in the before and after worlds. In those other worlds, Joe and 22 are gently pushed toward their destinies by the reassuring voice of the cubist Counselor Jerry (Alice Braga) amid a madcap series of detours carrying the emotional highs and lows of an inspired jazz trumpeter’s solo.

Foxx and Fey are joyfully harmonious, backed by jazzy arrangements from Jonathan Batiste, an ethereal score from Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross and a stellar supporting group of voice actors that includes Phylicia Rashad, Daveed Diggs, June Squibb, Rachel House, Wes Studi and a perfectly nutty Graham Norton. 

And though Soul delivers plenty of whimsical fun, it’s anchored by the existential yearning Docter hinted at with Inside Out’s “Bing Bong” character five years ago. 

But just when you think you know where the film will leave you, it has other plans, and that’s okay. Because while the best of Pixar has always touched us with family adventures that speak to what it means to be human, Soul leaves plenty of room for our own improvisations, producing a heartfelt composition that may be Pixar’s most profound statement to date.

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Come and Watch Us Sing and Play

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Monkey Kingdom

by Hope Madden

Earth Day rears its smiling, nervously optimistic head once again with Disneynature’s latest eco-doc Monkey Kingdom.

Directors Mark Linfield and Alastair Fothergill have carved an impressive career of environmental documentaries, for both the large and small screen. Monkey Kingdom boasts the same skillful mixture of environmental grandeur and character-driven intimacy, and the film is as visually glorious as any in this series. Still, you have to wonder how many hours of wildlife footage is accrued before the filmmakers can impose a storyline on the proceedings.

That is not to suggest the tale is entirely make believe. Monkey Kingdom rolls cameras in the jungles of South Asia, capturing the complex social structure of a macaque monkey troop. What unfolds is a kind of Cinderella story of the low-born Maya and her efforts to fend for herself and her newborn.

As we’ve come to expect from Disney’s doc series, Monkey Kingdom sheds light on the intricate social workings of the subject, and macaques turn out to be fascinating creatures with the kind of structured social order that begs for exactly this treatment. At first we watch as lowly Maya sleeps in the cold and eats from the ground while the alpha and other high born monkeys nap in sunlight and feast on the ripe fruit at the top of the tree. Can she ever hope for more? (At least we can rest assured that there’s no make-over coming.)

The intricate pecking order sets the perfect stage for an underdog film full of scrap, perseverance and triumph.

Narrator Tina Fey’s smiling, workaday feminism gives the film personality and relates it to humanity without having to even try.

While the film keeps your attention throughout, Monkey Kingdom lacks some of the punch of other Disney Earth Day flicks. Linfield and Fothergill’s 2012 film Chimpanzee had the 5-year-olds at my screening sobbing breathlessly, whereas Monkey Kingdom might elicit a compassionate frown.

Between the built-in drama of the “overcoming adversity” storyline and the occasional giddy monkey hijinks (the bit where the troop crashes a birthday party is particularly enjoyable), the film compels attention as it shares eco-savvy information kids may even remember.

Documentary purists will balk at the anthropomorphized story, but families will enjoy this thoroughly entertaining film.

Verdict-3-5-Stars





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Save it for When You’re Sick

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This Is Where I Leave You

by Christie Robb

You’ve probably seen it before: a broken man forced by circumstance to return to his family home and reconnect with the life he had before, somehow, it all went awry. But you probably haven’t seen it with such enormous fake tits.

This Is Where I Leave You is as familiar and unchallenging as a bowl of chicken soup. Shawn Levy’s adaptation of the book by Jonathan Tropper places the spotlight on Jason Bateman’s Judd, a sad-sack who actually sits down for a breath and watches while his boss bones his wife on their marital bed. While couch surfing and growing out his obligatory beard of depression, he receives a phone call from his sister (Tina Fey) informing him that his father has died. His last request: that the kids sit shiva together for a week.

The family gathers with attendant significant others and kidlets and are encouraged by their oversharing, breast-enhanced mom (Jane Fonda), to let it all hang out and really get into the grief.

Like the bowl of chicken soup, you know exactly what you are going to get when you start. Family brawls. Run-ins with old loves. Finding dad’s secret stash of weed… You can ease into a nap worry-free. You’ll be able to figure out what happened before you dig the sleep crusties out of your eye creases.

The ensemble cast works to provide a little spice to an otherwise bland dramedy. Adam Driver (Girls) is great as the black sheep baby of the family and steals every scene that he’s in with a manic, fresh delivery and moments of puppy dog eyed sincerity. His interactions with the rabbi (Ben Schwartz from Parks and Recreation) who cannot shake his childhood nickname, Boner, are particularly delightful.  But the talent mostly drowns in the soppy sentimentality and same-ness of it all.

I’m not saying the flick isn’t worth seeing. Just watch it at home nestled in a blanket, coughing out a lung  with a bottle of NyQuil at your side.

Verdict-2-5-Stars

 

 

 





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More Muppet, Less Man

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Muppets Most Wanted

 

by MaddWolf

 

There are few casts of characters who have brought more sheer delight to audiences – regardless of age – than the Muppets. Sure, they’ve had their low points (good God, the Muppet Babies!), but on the whole, their variety show mayhem has offered nothing but fun.
The fuzzy ensemble returns this week for their 8th feature film, Muppets Most Wanted.

 

The new adventure picks up immediately after the finale of 2011’s The Muppets, when the group is approached by prospective road manager Dominic Badguy (Ricky Gervais), who wants them to launch a world tour.

Meanwhile, the diabolical Constantine, a dead-ringer for our beloved Kermie and widely known the world’s most dangerous frog, breaks out of a Russian gulag. Coincidence?

About 3/4 of the team that brought Kermit and Co. back after more than a decade of absence for The Muppets returns for the sequel. Producer/co-writer/star Jason Segel is noticeably absent, though, having made the upcoming Sex Tape instead (although that could have given the Muppet franchise an interesting wrinkle).

But director James Bobin, co-writer Nicholas Stoller, and, perhaps importantly, songwriter Bret McKenzie return.

McKenzie (one half of the comedy duo Flight of the Conchords) delivers clever enough tunes such as “We’re Doing a Sequel”, “I’m Number One”, and “Interrogation Song,” but none come close to the charm of “Man or Muppet,” his Oscar-winner from the last film.

And though most of the flesh and blood crew that made The Muppets so warm, fun, irreverent and yet sweet return, the film is clearly missing something. Segel, we’re looking at you.

The important characters are all accounted for: Kermit, Miss Piggy, Dr. Teeth, Bunsen Honeydew and Beeker, Fozzie, Gonzo, Sam Eagle, etc, etc.

And, the requisite cameos pile up: Diddy, Chloe Moretz, Usher, Ray Liotta, Danny Trejo, Tom Hiddleston, Zach Galafianakis, Saoirse Ronan, Celine Dion, Salma Hayak, Tony Bennett, Josh Groban – it’s a long list.

Though the film does many things right – starting with putting the spotlight back on the Muppets themselves – it can’t shake the feeling that this is more an assignment than a labor of love. The mistaken identity plot begins to drag, even with co-starring roles for Tina Fey as the Gulag warden and Ty Burrell as a bumbling inspector.

It’s fun enough, nostalgic enough, self-reverential enough, but never magical.

 

Verdict-3-0-Stars

 

 





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Maybe put Fey in the new Anchorman instead?

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By Hope Madden

The idea of pairing Tina Fey and Paul Rudd is very appealing. They are funny, smart and talented – and yet so often willing to take soft-boiled parts where they play socially awkward cutie pies. Like, for instance, Admission.

Fey plays Portia, a buttoned-up Princeton admissions counselor looking for happiness in a hum drum life inside the ivory tower. Rudd’s John, on the other hand, is an impetuous free spirit currently serving the youth of the world as an alternative school teacher.

Both of these misguided adults decide to help one unusual teen get into Princeton in this good hearted, underwhelming comedy about parents and children and the damage we do to each other.

Of course, Portia and John fall for each other, Portia comes to terms with her ambition and her mother (a scene-stealing Lily Tomlin), John realizes fatherhood requires some sacrifice, and lessons are learned just all over the place. Sounds hilarious, doesn’t it?

Nope. Funny is not the word to describe Admission.  And that’s a crime, really. Wasting comic talents like Rudd and Fey should come with consequences.

Director Paul Weitz knows how to orchestrate a smart comedy, having helmed flicks from the raucous American Pie to the complex About a Boy to the wizened American Dreamz. Unfortunately, he cannot find his rhythm here.

Karen Croner seems a likely culprit. The screenwriter had never written a comedy before and frankly, still hasn’t. Working from the novel by Jean Hanff Korelitz, Croner is content to embed flat one liners into a laid back comment on finding true happiness in age old family values.

Side plots abound, each meant to create humiliating moments of comic gold for Fey. Unfortunately, every zany tale – whether with an ex-boyfriend (an underused Michael Sheen), an office rival (Gloria Reuben), or a ferocious mother – goes nowhere.

Fey overworks the “frazzled woman pretending to have it all together” bit, trying too hard to generate energy and chuckles in scenes without potential. A charming, warm Rudd is nothing if not likeable, but he, too, suffers from an absence of opportunity to draw more than a few fond smiles.

Very little works in this toothless comedy that has courage enough to avoid a tidy ending, yet still falls back on an almost offensively traditional image of happiness, one that requires roots, a man, a woman, and a child.

2 stars (out of 5)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Lc9DwpMo6M