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Sideways
Reviewed by Uri Lessing
In Alexander Payne's new neurotic comedy, Sideways, two old college
friends come together for a weeklong trip through the central coastal
vineyards of California. For Miles (Paul Giamatti), a recently divorced
struggling writer, it's a chance to celebrate his best friend's impending
wedding while indulging his fanaticism for fine wine. For Jack (Thomas
Haden Church), a shallow has-been actor, this trip is a chance to sow
his oats one last time before tying the knot. Neither man gets what he
expects.
Jack falls head over heels in lust with a local wine pourer, Sandra
Oh, and Miles finds himself drinking too much wine, struggling with his
own self-hatred, and facing his feelings of sadness and regret over his
divorce. The only brightness in his life is Maya (Virginia Madsen), a
waitress studying to be a winemaker.
Giamatti delivers an unflinching portrayal. His characterization of
Miles is superior to Woody Allen's character studies in neurosis, because
his performance brings out Miles' appeal without relying on pity to earn
the audience's affection. Giamatti and Church play off each other splendidly.
There is no earthly reason why these two men should be friends. One is
intellectual, introspective and has a discerning palate for wine; the
other is selfish, small-minded and could care less whether or not he is
drinking merlot or Manishevitz. Still, they weave an aged, comfortable
and essential friendship. In the hands of another writer or director,
this premise could have resulted in a banal comedy or a sappy drama, but
in the hands of Alexander Payne (Election, About Schmidt), it becomes
a leisurely paced film about introspection, neurosis and finding tranquility.
The title, Sideways, refers to the idea that fine wine is always
stored sidelong so that the cork remains moist and prevents oxygen from
entering the bottle. Like fine wine, both characters have stopped growing
a long time ago. Miles' and Jack's careers and friendship are stagnant.
They're not growing: they're aging.
Their trip together doesn't bring either man happiness, but perhaps happiness
is not the goal here. In Payne's last road trip film, About Schmidt, Warren
realizes at the end of his married and professional life, that his existence
lacks any recognition from anyone. Like Schmidt, the characters in Sideways
are searching for appreciation, a feeling that anyone living in the 21st
century can understand. (R) Rating: 5
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Enduring Love
Reviewed by Russ Simmons
With a title like Enduring Love, one might expect a romantic comedy
or a four-hankie weeper.
That is hardly the case with a new British import, an adaptation of Ian
McEwan's 1997 novel. The title is probably meant to be ironic or, in a
worse case scenario, a warning.
There are certain romantic attachments that we hope never last. Such is
the case with Joe (Daniel Craig), a college professor and wannabe novelist.
Love is a puzzle to him, even though he's strongly attached to his sculptor
girlfriend, Claire (Samantha Morton).
Joe, you see, is a skeptic about love. He sees all romantic feelings as
the biological stimulus for procreation. He pontificates on this subject
to his students or, when drunk, to his friends.
Everything changes for Joe and Claire one idyllic day when they visit
the countryside for a picnic. A hot air balloon plunges to a near crash,
and then begins to drift in the wind. The pilot had bailed out, but a
young boy remained inside. As Joe and a group of men rush to try to rescue
the boy, a gust of wind blows it back into the air.
All of the men (including Joe) let go, except for one. He's blown hundreds
of feet up with the balloon, slips and falls to his death. One would-be
rescuer is Jed (Rhys Ifans), a lanky, shaggy-haired fellow who asks Joe
to pray with him over the dead man's body. The horrifying experience has
a profound effect on both men. Joe is guilt-ridden and unusually anxious.
When Jed asks Joe to see him several days later, Joe reluctantly agrees
hoping for a catharsis. Unfortunately, the mentally unstable Jed has fallen
in love with Joe, perceiving that the tragedy sparked an emotional bond
between them. Joe rejects Jed's advances, but that doesn't stop him. Joe
and Claire become the victims of a madman's stalking.
The cast is uniformly fine, with Ifans' Jed a particularly creepy provocateur.
Director Roger Michell (Notting Hill) gets a bit showy with the
visuals and the musical soundtrack by Jeremy Sams gets very heavy-handed
at times, but their occasional overindulgence doesn't derail this intelligent
enterprise.
Enduring Love is more than a British art house version of Fatal
Attraction, thanks largely to Joe Penhall's intelligent script that plays
a bit like a dramatic treatise on the nature of love. It's also believably
disturbing. (Stay through the credits to find out what ultimately happens
to the characters.) (R) Rating: 3
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SpongeBob
SquarePants Movie
Reviewed by Uri Lessing
It's strange that the most successful children's shows are also the most
bizarre. Among the characters our children have been captivated by are
kung-fu turtles named after famous painters, cars and trucks that turn
into giant robots, kids who roam the earth collecting monsters in red
and white balls.
Lately, a nerdish sea sponge and his undersea friends have captivated
our youth. Now with billions in retail sales and fans all over the globe
under his belt, SpongeBob SquarePants is coming to the big screen.
SpongeBob has a lot in common with Pee Wee Herman. He wears the clothing
of an adult (tie, slacks and white shirt) and displays the enthusiasm
of a child. He wears his heart on his sleeve while staying blissfully
naïve.
SpongeBob's personality seems derivate of the boys portrayed in1950's
hygiene films. If he were a human he'd probably find himself perpetually
picked on. Yet fate, friends and his own enthusiasm always help SpongeBob
remain on top of life.
In The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, our hero must save his friends
by leaving Bikini Bottom on a quest to find King Midas's stolen crown.
He journeys with his best friend, a starfish named Patrick, who fills
the role of the typical ³stupid² cartoon character. (Sam Gangee he ain't!)
Together, they survive underwater biker bars, mean-spirited sea monsters
and eventually end up on dry land. The most creative moments involve live-action
scenes. One follows a band of pirates as they sail to the latest movie
theater to catch The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie. However, the
most bizarre sequence involves a fight scene that takes place on David
Hasselhoff's sea-borne body.
Both a riveting action sequence and an anatomy lesson involving Hasselhoff's
hairy neck, back and thighs, it's doubtful that this clever scene will
ever be repeated. Nevertheless, like many film adaptations of cartoons,
the filmmakers have to face the challenge of turning 30-minute material
into a feature length movie.
The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie asks the audience to endure three
times as much frenetic potty humor, repetitive jokes and screechy voice
acting as they are used to. The result is exhausting.
The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie is not an unpleasant experience,
just one that won't have a large impact. With films like The Incredibles
out there, it's just not enough. (PG) Rating: 2
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National
Treasure
Reviewed by Deborah Young
At the beginning of National Treasure young Benjamin
Franklin Gates (Hunter Gomez) is sitting in a room with his grandfather,
who tells him a fanciful story about a treasure hidden by this country's
founding fathers and protected by the Knights of Templar.
Do you want to be a knight? ³Yes,² Benjamin replies. His grandfather then
goes through the motions of making the boy a knight. In the next scene,
the boy is gone, replaced by an adult Ben (Nicolas Cage). The camera catches
the dramatic shift between intrigued boy and resolute man.
A close-up of Cage's face emphasizes those sparkling
aqua eyes that on close inspection look like magical gems encasing worlds
of scorching heat and blinding light, and that furrowed brow that communicates
both confusion and fortitude.
Once Cage enters the picture, the movie morphs into action
mode. Ben is on a quest reminiscent of the one dramatized in Dan Brown's
wildly popular novel The Da Vinci Code. But unlike the book's main
character, Ben is searching for a national treasure, certainly a less
noble quest than searching for the Holy Grail.
The screenwriters try to elevate the search for the fortune
by linking it with the ideas of freedom and liberty, but their fictional
treasure can't touch the complexity and controversy that surrounds Brown's
book. National Treasure has snippets of dialogue that seem to reference
the current presidential administration's strikes on personal freedoms
and hint at a blind side in national security that made an event like
the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 possible. But these attempts at depth
simply make the film seem less significant.
National Treasure is at its best when the characters
have clues to decode and logistics problems to solve. To find the treasure,
Ben has to decipher a string of clues, including code written on the back
of the Declaration of Independence. But here's the hitch: the Declaration
is locked in a room in the National Archives that's accessible to a select
few and guarded by an intricate alarm system. The enigma: How will Ben
get into the room, get the Declaration and escape without getting arrested?
Writers Jim Kouf and Cormac and Maryann Wibberley had
the perfect story formula to make this type of movie work. They arranged
for Ben, his sidekick Riley (Justin Bartha), and lady historian Abigail
Chase (Diane Kruger) to get into various tight spots, and then they conjured
some clever ways for the trio to squeeze out.
The movie's characters are likeable enough, but the true
star of this film is plot, plot and plot. Despite the letdown of its tightly
wrapped happily-ever-after ending, most of National Treasure's
100 minutes are engaging. That makes the film a treasure (just maybe not
a billion-dollar one). (PG) Rating: 3
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Forces
of Nature
Reviewed by Russ Simmons
As long as you can observe them from the safety of a giant screen theatre,
natural disasters can be a lot of fun. The latest offering at Union Station's
Extreme Screen is Forces of Nature, a visually stunning documentary
from the good folks at National Geographic. Director George Casey
(Africa: The Serengeti) ably captures the frightening power of
volcanoes, earthquakes and tornadoes in this aptly named flick. Forces
of Nature (which is not to be confused with the similarly named romantic
comedy starring Ben Affleck and Sandra Bullock) makes good use of some
skillfully rendered computer generated imagery as well as awe inspiring
footage of Mother Nature at her most furious.
Narrator Kevin Bacon begins the film with an explanation of Earth's
violent origins, accompanied by animation that uses the giant screen to
put things into perspective. The constant activity that takes place under
Earth's crust is illustrated though computer graphics that seamlessly
melds into actual footage of a volcanic eruption. The film then focuses
on a major volcanic incident that occurred on the Caribbean island of
Montserrat in 1995.
As volcanologist Marie Edmonds explains (accompanied by some amazing
aerial shots), the Soufriere Hills volcano exploded in a titanic plume
of ash and soot that buried the nearby town of Plymouth. Because of advance
warning, no one in the city was killed.
Nineteen residents of the rural areas, those who ignored the advance
warnings, were not so fortunate. Shifting to another point on the globe,
the film takes a look at an even more damaging natural phenomenon. Scientist
Ross Stein, an expert on earthquakes, takes us to Turkey where he and
a team of colleagues worked to try to find a pattern in a series of quakes
there.
A computer model they developed while studying the North Anatolian Fault
helped them to predict the 1999 earthquake that rattled Izmit. Finally,
the film centers on the work of Joshua Wurman and a team of storm chasers
who attempt to track down a twister in Oklahoma. Driving a duo of Doppler
radar trucks, Wurman and crew place themselves in grave danger as they
try to precisely position their equipment in order to take readings that
may give them clues into how the mysterious storms are formed.
As with most giant screen entries, the visuals are the attraction here.
Forces of Nature is a painless science lesson, filling our minds
by feasting our eyes. (G) Rating: 3
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