In the new tradition of remaking the old comedy tropes (the last day of high school) with female leads and stories, we have Booksmart to add to the collection. Beanie Feldstein who also starred in another senior year movie Lady Bird and Kaitlyn Rezen are 2 best friends about to go in separate directions and decide to cut loose their last night a la Superbad.
So that turns into One Crazy Night. One of the scenes is a murder mystery and the whole movie has a tinge of the girls interacting with the various high school characters which of course comes as little surprise. Except for the casting: there is an intention to showcase new faces which is welcome. There are some stars in small roles: Jason Sudekis, Lisa Kudrow, Will Forte.
Very similar to last year's Blockers, another prom night movie. Directed by Olivia Wilde.
Here we have a Nora Eprhon/Nancy Myers style story about 4 older women in a book club reading 50 Shades of Grey and the book awaking a sexual fire in each one of them in a different manner. Each character played by Jane Fonda, Candice Bergen, Mary Steenberger and Diane Keaton ( of course) is at a different place in their lives and each has a comedic arc.
Kudos for telling a new type of story. A lot of star power here. I might have liked a little more edge to to it but with the Sandra Bullock effect, when you have the stars, you do what they want to do.
I went expecting a Seth Rogen comedy and wound up with a Charlize Theron rom com. More Rom than Com. Unexpected in this time of year (they are usually Christmas stories), but like unexpected things, it was good.
Charlize Theron is Charlotte Field - "Madam Secretary" the Secretary of State to a Trump-ish President Chambers (Bob Odenkirk). Like in all rom coms, these beautiful, successful women can't find a date. So she meets an unexpected package, the schubby reporter Fred (Seth Rogen) at a Boys II Men show. Turns out she was his babysitter and he fantasized about her back then.
More rom com tropes emerge: the hidden nature of the relationship, the power imbalance, the disapproving friends, the crisis that bring them to the "will then or won't they?".
With a number of references both visual and auditory, it was kind of a modern reverse retelling of Pretty Woman (1990). Which turned out to be a pretty good thing.
O'Shea Jackson Jr. [you know him as Ice Cube] plays the supportive male friend.
It starts slow but builds up. Tie goes to the higher score: **** of 5
One of the Sundance favorites in January about @aoc, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, newest and youngest Congresswoman from New York. The Justice Project recruited new candidates to run in the 2018 elections and this documentary filmmaker Rachel Lears followed around 4 of them, Amy Vilela of Nevada, Paula Jean Swearengin of West Virginia, Cori Bush of St. Louis and AOC.
One of the benefits of documentary filmmaking is the ability to edit the story to build the arc of exactly what happened. So if there is success, we see the buildup to success and if there is failure, we see the warning signs.
The New York campaigning reminded me a lot of Weiner which I saw some years ago. Since he lost, no one ever saw that film. But since AOC is a household name now, Netflix paid $10 million for this film.
AOC comes off as a real natural here and there's certainly a hero buildup after we know of her success. Her opponent Joe Crowley certainly comes across as a schlub. But really we are putty in the hands of this fine filmaker.
