There are very few things as exhilarating to me as seeing an awesome movie in the theater. And I don't mean some Michael Bay crap. I mean movies like Blue Valentine or Fishtank or The Bourne Identity. But by that measure, there a fewer things worse than seeing a bad movie. In fact, I won't tolerate it. In the last four years I've developed a serious reputation for walking out of movies. So much so that if I'm even slightly concerned that a movie won't interest me, I probably won't go see it unless it's playing at the local luxury theater that comes equipped with a bookstore, a restaurant and a bar (!). If I'm on my own, and I love to indulge in a movie by myself, it's fine... but when you are with friends there is pressure to stay for the whole thing, if for no other reason than to discuss its flaws in the post-show recap. That's where the bar / restaurant comes in handy, I'm far less bored watching people and sipping a glass of wine than being subjected to a film that bores me or falls short of quality entertainment because of it's smug attitude - a movie that seems to say "I've got Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp all up in me, you're going to love me even though my script is half-written and I'm not what I've sold myself to be".
That brings me to this past weekend where I managed to walk out of, not one, but TWO movies in the space of 24 hours.
Now, granted, I was skeptical about both of them from the start. But I'm generally a skeptical person and I've been won over by many movies that I was lukewarm about when buying my ticket. So Friday afternoon, after a nice pitcher of New Orleans beer at the Farmer's Market with my friend Sandra (whom I was happily distracting from her dissertation), we decided to check out The Adjustment Bureau.
I'm no dummy. I'd heard solidly mixed reviews about this one. But also enough interesting things to think that it could well be worth my time. I don't mind Matt Damon and I love Emily Blunt, and that always helps... Well, this movie commits cinematic and story crimes for which it should be all kinds of punished - so much so that I was forced to sigh loudly in an obnoxious manner before, finally, getting the nerve up to ask Sandra if she was enjoying it. Thank god she said no. Freedom, fresh air and a beautiful L.A. day were waiting.
Here's my main quandary with a movie like this... where is the story? An hour in, I gots to have me some story! And I truly think the meet-cute-in-a-bathroom-and-fall-in-love-forever notion is played. Better. And there are some truly insipid details like.... a young, attractive New York state congressman wanders around on his own constantly, unnoticed by onlookers, unattended to by staffers? Do I know so little about state government that this seems impossible? (My former father-in-law is a lawyer and lobbyist for the state of Virginia and we couldn't go anywhere without a zillion people coming up to us. And that was Virginia. I don't think a zillion people even live there.) And all of this nonsense had nothing to do with the central theme of the movie, which I THINK was about how a group of magical people, one of whom being the yummy Anthony Mackie, control everyone's fate to their own benefit. So, undoubtedly, after we left Matt and Emily go on a wild goose chase to escape their "adjusted" fates, blah blah blah.
So, really, what we're talking about here is someone's cheap and underdeveloped rehash of a notion the Mr. Nolan was exploring in Inception. The difference being, Inception was interesting and engaging - if also downright confounding. And I don't really blame the director, I have to blame the screenwriter and whoever saw this through development. But that's a conundrum because George Nolfi wrote AND directed this and it's his directorial debut. Which leads me to a whole other diatribe about skilled screenwriters turning in to shit directors. But I'll save that for later... Suffice it to say, most often there is a great collaborative process between the director and the screenwriter in the wake of selling a script and then producing that script. In the best case scenario, the product rises out of its paper and becomes what an audience is attracted to. But often, seasoned and skilled screenwriters (which Mr. Nolfi certainly is) fail to maintain any objectivity when they are reworking their own material for their own purpose. Especially when you involve countless producers, development execs and a very big star.
And then there was Saturday. Which begs to point out a horrible snafu that seems to happen around big box office-y types.
In The Lincoln Lawyer, Matthew McConaughey plays a battle ready, rode hard defense attorney who is attracted to the worst kind of cases. But he's a Really Nice Guy. When the driver of his Lincoln, oh heee heee hee, asks what he'll be doing after M. McC. gets his driver's license back, Matthew responds with "I've had it back for 3 months now"... clearly he loves his astute black driver whose wisdom surely comes into play after I was forced to leave the movie.
Basically, what starts out as a brisk-ish, entertaining judicial mystery suddenly, in the early part of the second act, throws it's red-herring out the window, it's cards on table and devolves into a morality tale. Well, that's about all I can handle. You just don't switch horses mid-race.
