Run, Fat Boy, Run

Run, Fat Boy, Run is another quirky British comedy. Thandie Newton and Simon Pegg are the working class Londoners who once were engaged to be married. The token American is played by Hank Azaria as the jerky boyfriend who tries to thwart Pegg’s attempts at getting his girlfriend and mother of his child back by running a marathon. There are a few laughs but overall the movie is full of clichés and is very predictable. Beyond predictable it is just dumb in parts, especially the bits about training for the marathon. It is also another example of some schlub of a guy who amazingly ends up with a knockout.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall

Forgetting Sarah Marshall offers some a few good chuckles but in the end is a pretty forgettable movie. It's another Judd Apatow romantic comedy which means that it as slacker-striver romance with a dollop of teenage boy humour. This one has a lot less the teen-age boy humor than say SuperBad, but also doesn't have as many big laughs as that ridiculous movie. I liked all the actors in FSM, led by the likable Jason Segal and the equally likable Mila Kunis, from That 70's Show. Also, one of my favorites from Veronica Mars, Kristen Bell, is great. The strange Jack McBrayer, who plays Kenneth on 30 Rock, is also strange in this movie and plays a similar character to his 30 Rock role. But the previously unknown to me, British actor Russel Brand, steals the movie as Sarah Marshall's new boyfriend. He is very funny in a creepy way.

What Happens When You Watch Dumb Movies

I hate to admit when I watch some of the dumb movies I watch, such as my latest viewing, What Happens in Vegas which is another movie in the slacker-striver vein (see earlier blog entry on this topic) where we have Ashton Kutcher, fun-loving man child and Cameron Diaz, the uptight ambitious beauty. Blah, blah, blah, they hate each other -- Blah, blah, blah, they're forced to be together even though they hate eachother and tah-dah! They love eachother. This one has its fair share of over-the-top scenes and very few genuine moments -- there are a few-- and even a few funny scenes. But there you have it, another movie I watched, so you don't have to.

Definitely, Maybe

Romantic Comedies have so much potential to be good and so often go astray, that I have kinda given up on them (In an earlier blog I wrote about the modern preponderance of slacker-striver types of romantic comedies that have added to my disappointment in this genre). So when my friend Ruth insisted that Definitely, Maybe, the recent attempt at romance with Ryan Reynolds, was better than most, I thought I would give it a try. And yeah, it was alright. It had a suspenseful plot and the final happy couple did seem right for each other. The romantic comedy conventions (find each other in a cute way, face an obstacle, overcome said obstacle) made sense and did not seemed forced. There was even a nice bit having to do with the novel Jane Eyre that was fresh. It wasn't another movie-potential-gone-terribly-wrong like in 27 dresses; however, it still succumbed to over the top attempts at humour that are just painful to watch, such as when school children were raving at their parents after they received a sex-ed lesson at school. One reason to watch is Rachel Weisz who is so interesting to watch that you wish she were in the movie more.

David Denby's "A Fine Romance"

David Denby, movie critic for The New Yorker, wrote in the July 23rd issue about the modern romantic comedy. He compares today's romantic comedies with ones of the 30s such as It Happened one Night and The Philadelphia story where the man is the "love object" and the woman the "pursuer". He describes the modern romance film of the last 10 years such as High Fidelity, The Break Up, and Knocked Up as the slacker-striver romance: Man a good-natured slob and woman an intense career driven beauty with little spirit.
This article really struck me because I have always found this view of women in these modern films annoying where the men act like children who like being silly and having a good time and the woman are their disapproving mothers. Yuck! Why can't the woman be silly and goofy. And why would these accomplished woman want to be with these slovenly men? It seems to me that this view of men and women is depicted in many aspects of our media, commercials, Sitcoms etc. Why isn't the woman fun anymore? And if I were a man I would be offended by this view of themselves, ambitionless losers who are kinda cute but without much substance.
Perhaps this view mirrors our society where woman who work full-time, raise children, and keep a household together, seem to lose their sense of humour, while men look for escape routes from the modern expectations placed upon them.
I don't know. But I like the term "slacker-striver" -- it really hits the nail on the head, and I look for modern movies that go beyond this simplistic view of women and men.