March 2021 Movie Round Up
Vibes Corner
I didn’t pick this set of movies with any sort of theme in mind. Maybe (Definitely) its quarantine getting to me, but I found many of the movies I enjoyed recently were just pleasurable to “live in”.
Best ‘Best Friends Movie Club’ Watch — Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003) (dir. Peter Weir)
Pirates of the Caribbean is one of my favourite movies ever. So my expectations were quite high going in. They still managed to blow me away. The heart of the movie; displaying such patience with every scene, is an art very much lost in the commercial epics we get today. The 2 hour 20 minute run time forces you to question what could have been trimmed. The Galapagos storyline feels entirely unnecessary, but much of the movies charm exists from living in the world, not cramming any sort of agenda down your throat. The intense moments — i.e. leading up to the big battle — feel extremely reminiscent of the Battle of Helm’s Deep in The Two Towers.
Crowe and Bettany’s friendship doesn’t have the same meaning without the poignancy of the patience. Russell Crowe’s charisma is off the charts; forcing me to go on a run of his movies and remind myself just how unique I think his acting abilities really are.
Favourite Animated — Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993)
You probably watched some of them on television growing up. There is a whole slew of Animated DC Original movies, all around 60–90 minutes, that are consistently solid. The story is interesting enough in its own right, but the verisimilitude of Gotham elevates it to another level. This one exists in a 1940s Gotham, with an old school animation vibe that creates a mood perfect for a dark Batman plot.
Best Hang — Everybody Wants Some (2014) (dir. Richard Linklater)
This movie recently snuck up on me as something I may love. Turns out, I was right. The lines can feel a little corny and overacted, the music is fairly on the nose, and the overly 70s aesthetic give it an almost faux-like nature.
What works for Everybody Wants Some really works. You get to know an astonishing number of characters. They all bring different stereotypes to the table, but feel lived in and developed enough that you don’t question certain stiff line readings. Scott Glen is a treasure from start to finish. Blake Jenner starring as Jake does a serviceable job as the audience avatar, comfortably sitting back to be entertained as much as the viewers. My crush on Zoe Deutch continues to grow as I discover her in effortlessly charming roles at every turn.
If the merit of this movie is not proved to you by the 25 minute baseball practice that takes place at the end of the second act, then I’m not sure this movie is for you. A scene deftly pulled off with no explanation whatsoever, Linklater builds on his Dazed and Confused world with a college setting adult enough, yet playful enough, to make me wonder why it doesn’t have the same cultural resonance as Dazed.
Carell Corner
A question I keep turning to recently; who hurt Steve Carell? This man plays some of the most broken down, sad men I’ve ever seen on screen. All three of these movies exploit upon a hurt rarely seen so consistently.
Many comedians who’ve made the move from comedy into drama have played broken down people. The psychoanalysis of “the loudest and funniest guy in the room is compensating for the most” is an easy corollary. Robin Williams, Jim Carrey, Adam Sandler, all scream — literally — that notion. Bill Murray exudes it in a quieter way — with his lackadaisical cynicism from the first half of his career accentuating the sad men he plays in later roles in Rushmore and Lost in Translation.
Maybe it’s just from watching to much of The Office. But Carrell doesn’t emit such brokenness behind his wall of humour in my opinion. I don’t see it in Anchorman, or Get Smart either. Unfortunately I cannot speak to his earlier time on television.
After watching Little Miss Sunshine, I went down a Steve Carell rabbit hole, as I realized what he’d actually unlocked within all his dramatic performances. The other Carell movies I don’t mention below are the 40-Year Old Virgin and Dinner for Schmucks; which both directly align with the same painful awkwardness that Carrell seems terrified to share, but horrible and hiding.
Favourite Rewatch — Little Miss Sunshine (2006) (dir. Jonathan Dayton, Valerie Faris)
It’s unclear to me how anyone could struggle enjoying this movie. Every single performance is perfect. There’s humour, humanity, shifting family dynamics, people play high/low in one moment, and playing in between as the next player takes a possession. No character is infallible or irredeemable.
The story itself does not waiver, nor does it refuse to linger on its darkest moments. The bones of where the movie is headed, and what its trying to say, may be obvious on the surface. Somehow it still manages to subvert expectations and keep you on your toes scene to scene. It’s done in a way that could feel over the top, but the table was set early on enough that no outcome feels out of sorts.
Welcome to Marwen (2016) (dir. Robert Zemeckis)
Created off the back of the documentary Marwencol, about the real Mark Hogancamp (played by Steve Carell), Welcome to Marwen tows a line of creepiness that leaves viewers writhing in many ways. This movie has no business being even mildly entertaining, but Robert Zemeckis injects just enough warmth to make it work. Carell’s innocence adds just enough innocuity.
Similar to Ed Wood — a movie I wrote about in my February roundup — Welcome to Marwen’s protagonist is into drag. Similar to Tim Burton’s efforts in the 1994 biopic, there is no deprecation about the topic. As fortunate as that is, it still manages to skirt the issue of Hogey’s objectification of the women in his live he photographs for his stop-motion movies. His admiration of these women, however innocent, seems to unintentionally play as a pseudo-feminist commentary that I have yet to decide on the effectiveness of.
The movie tiptoes around other issues, such as Mark Hogancamp’s drinking. It very much ignores most of the female cast’s point of view. Yet the examination inside the mind of a man scarred and left for dead — literally and figuratively — leaves an impressive investment into the life and art of Mark Hogancamp. The re-telling of Hogey’s actually story had the chance to be done much worse than how Zemeckis went about it, as he left enough suspense and questions unanswered early on. I liked Welcome to Marwen more than most, and it’s not without its problems. There is something to be said for a movie with this much heart, that manages to be so simultaneously optimistic and pessimistic towards our society.
Dan in Real Life (2007) (dir. Peter Hedges)
Dan in Real Life teeters an interesting line between family dramedy and romantic comedy. Steve Carrell is the single father of three daughters — figuring out the obvious difficulties that come of that — after his wife passed away a few years prior.
The movie does a pretty good job balancing the love interest arc alongside the daughters arc. It leans into its more rom-com-y tendencies, with the “we’re all going away somewhere gorgeous,” and “big embarrassing moment” tropes. There is enough time interwoven with the daughters, that ultimately I think it’s fine that it leans that direction, as the chemistry between Carell and Juliette Binoche is so quiet it practically boils over out of the screen.
The movie subverts certain concepts. Dane Cook plays a bit against type — displaying some pain, and some real humour, in stride with a favourite of mine from his work on Bloodline (as Kevin), Norbert Leo Butz. Cook never has the temper tantrum, or nasty betrayal, one might expect. The only questionable role is Carell’s on screen mother, played by Dianne Wiest, who is subtly nasty to him for reasons never explained.
If you’re looking for a neat bow in a romcom you’ll likely be sorely disappointed, but Dan in Real Life does a serviceable job of landing the plane in a simple enough way that I was left grinning after my thoroughly enjoyable first watch.
