State of Play, the miniseries

State of Play is in theaters now with Russel Crowe, Ben Affleck, and Rachel McAdams. The movie is based on a BBC mini-series by the same name. I was very interested in this movie, loving a good newsroom story as I do, (see side bar for great newsroom movies) but thought that first I should see the miniseries. So I did. The BBC version is a 6 part series with great stalwart British actors such as Bill Nighy, and new on the scene super cute actors like James McAvoy. It tells the story of a friendship between a politician and a journalist and a murder of the politician,s lover. It’s a fast paced drama with intrigues around every corner and a team of journalists working together to solve the mystery. Kelly McDonald plays the Scottish cub reporter who is so darn cute (I can see Rachel McAdams in this part) and is great in the part. Bill Nighy as always is hilarious as the newspaper editor. This movie was pretty darn entertaining. It took a while to get used to the accents but in the end very enjoyable. I am now very curious about how they will make this 6 hour min-series into a 2 hour movie, Hollywood style. I’m sure it will not be as good, she said cynically, but I still want to see it.

Lost in Austen

I was so thrilled when I learned of Lost in Austen, the BBC miniseries. I mean who more than I, a devoted Jane Austen fan, would enjoy a fantasy trip to the world of Pride and Prejudice. Oh the possibilities, you could befriend the beloved Elizabeth, or tell off some vile character like Mrs. Bennet, Lady Catherine, or Mr. Collins. And indeed the 4 part miniseries indulges many of these fantasies; it thrusts 21st century Amanda Price into the Regency world where she navigates her way around ridiculous situations and the tried and true problems of time travel.
However, somewhere along the way this fantasy trip falls flat. Maybe it is because it tries to do too much. And more importantly it lacks what is best about Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth (she’s been catapulted to the future in place of Price’s character). The story goes too far and then doesn't offer explanations for many goofy plot turns. Why, for example, is Darcy taken to the future and then back in regency England and then forgets all about it? Also, Amanda Price doesn’t seem to have a central goal in the miniseries. She tries to manipulate the events in the story based on her knowledge of the novel and puts herself into a number of circumstances for comical reasons, but she never achieves her stated goal: to try to preserve the novel’s outcomes.
And the Darcy isn’t very good. That’s always the problem with any remake of Pride and Prejudice. Who can compete with Colin Firth’s version? (although I thought Matthew MacFadyen who was just seen BBC’s Little Dorrit, was a good Darcy) . One good point of the movie was the Mr. Wickam played by Tom Riley -- I liked the twist taken with his character and the clever way it was shown that our prejudices may have been wrong about him – plus the actor was much more interesting to look at than Darcy.
Overall, I thought, bummer, I wish it could have been better. But maybe there’s hope, and BBC will put Amanda Price into Persuasion where she will interact with Anne Elliot and tell off Anne’s awful sister Elizabeth.

Sabrina

An old favorite on TCM today. Gosh I love Audrey Hepburn. She has such a likable quality. What is it? She seems so genuine and angelic at the same time. She makes you root for her but not envy her. The problem always with this 1954 original version of Sabrina (it was remade in 1995 with Julia Ormond, Harrison Ford, and Greg Kinnear) is Humphrey Bogart. He and Hepburn just do not go together. An otherwise very good romantic comedy dashed because of this poor casting decision. But of course, it’s worth watching just to see the lovely Audrey Hepburn, but this movie is not as as good as say, Roman Holiday.

Doubt

I finally saw Doubt after having read about it, seeing actor interviews about it, and catching the Oscar hype. etc. So of course that colors the way you see a movie. Also, I watched it with my Catholic parents, coloring the view even further. My dad's reaction was, "Is this all it is about?" My mom hated that one of her favorite actresses, Meryl Streep, played such a negative character. Besides my mom enjoying some of the music (she sang along to a favorite hymn: "Holy God, We Praise my Name") and thinking that they did show a good side to the Catholic church in the movie -- we don't see the stereotypically awful harsh world of the Catholic church that is often portrayed in the movies -- she got bored with it. Indeed it was slow. The movie seemed like a stage play that maybe should have stayed on stage. Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Amy Adams were also very good in the movie. Hoffman's homilies were probably some of the more interesting parts of the movie. And the part that is in doubt? Well, it seemed kind of ridiculous in the end. It seemed like a nun who is always looking for evil and when not finding proof of it, invents it.

Frozen River

Frozen River is a little movie that probably nobody would have seen if it weren’t for the fact that Melissa Leo was nominated for best supporting actress for her role as Ray Eddy, a woman who is struggling to get by while trying to raise two children. To do that she makes a drastic decision to help another down on her luck character, Lila Littlewolf, smuggle people over the border between New York State and Canada by a Mohawk Indian Reservation. It’s a stark, cold splash of water on the face movie. One that you can sense from the outset is going to have a train wreck of an ending. Unpredictably, when the train wreck finally happens, it’s not as bad as you could imagine. For a movie that is about hardscrabble people with hardscrabble lives Frozen River is surprisingly uplifting. And the Oscar nominated Leo is fantastic (I remember loving her on Homicide, Life on the Street). Her son in the movie, Ray Eddy, is appealingly played by Charlie McDermott. And Misty Upham as Lila Littlewolf, is also great, deserving of a nomination as well, I thought.

Adventureland

I must be getting old when the 80s is a distant memory, and I had so much enjoyment in the nostalgia trip that Adventureland took me on. The movie takes you to the summer of 1987 with mixed tapes, 80’s hair dos, and Gremlins and no cell phones to be found. Jesse Eisenberg plays James, a recent college grad whose plans of going to Europe for the summer are dashed when his family falls on hard times, and he has to save money for graduate school. He ends up in the only job a literature major can find apparently, manning the sleazy midway games at a second rate theme park, Adventureland. There, he falls for the cute Em played by Kristen Stewart who is also have some tough times, and he befriends the gawky cynic Joel (Martin Starr) who as some of the funniest lines in the movie.
I remember seeing the trailer and thinking that this movie was going to be another Superbad, only in a theme park, meaning another rambling vulgar teenage boy journey with the ubiquitous alums from Freaks and Geeks (not that Superbad didn’t have its hilarious moments). Instead with Adventureland we get a real story and main characters who have some depth. Sure there’s some extraneous vulgarity and teen age boy humor (one character likes to punch James in the nuts, don’t get it) but Adventureland is the evolved Superbad – well-worth seeing, especially if your formative years were planted in the 80s like me.
Oh and the sound track is a part of the fun with Husker Du, The Replacements, “Unsatisfied” and Lou Reed, “Satellite of Love”. Of course, the other less cool songs that are burned in my memory too.

Elegy

Ben Kingsley, who I have loved in roles such as Gandhi, House of Sand and Fog, and most recently The Wackness, failed to impress me in Elegy. I found the character he plays, David Kepesh, a college professor, heartless and kind of pathetic. (Richard Jenkins in The Visitor who also plays a cynical professor, is so much more interesting to watch and easier to care about) The central relationship of the movie for the professor is with the much younger sexy temptress Consuela, played by guess who? The woman who plays a sexy temptress better than any one else, Penelope Cruz. The movie centers around this May-December romance, but I never really felt the connection between these two. I tried to think of other movies where this type of relationship seemed right so I googled May-December relationships and wouldn't you know, there is actually a Wikipedia site called List of films featuring May-December romances. From the list, both older men with younger women and older women with younger men, none of them strike me as couples with incredible chemistry. So maybe I have trouble seeing this type or romance as fodder for a good movie. Despite all this, there is something missing in Elegy; it lacks heart, I didn't really care about too much about any of the characters even though they all try to cope with tragic situations. Great actors such as Peter Sarsgaard, Dennis Hopper, and Patricia Clarkson, experience heart ache and even a heart attack, but failed to move me.