Looks to me like Jane Fonda may be the only reason to see "Monsters In Law" and I will wait until it hits HBO -- maybe wouldn't even rent the DVD.
A local critic called the movie Monster in Law a "Lo Blow." Ouch!
Most of the critics panned Lopez' performance as positiverly her worse and a very poor vehicle for a comback to films for Fonda.
Some actors will do anything for a little more money and glimpse of notoriety.
I think it's more of a case of loosing touch with film as an art media and how to spot good or bad scripts -- I can't image Fonda needs the money. The combo looks great and I'm sure all, especially Fonda, though it would be fun to do but it just didn't come off like expected. Have to blame the writers and director more than anyone else. Ah, well, I hope Jane sticks with it and gets cast in something worthwhile.
Always glad to see you post, ragman.
Hi, Light! I recall your movie chats from the good ole Abuzz days. BTW, have you ever taught a movie course - for fun or otherwise?
There's only hope as Fonda is talented actress and, at one time, had the taste and sense to pick good scripts.
On a much different and unrelated note, I recently started at looking at Cary Grant movies to get an idea what the well-dressed man should dress like.
A buy-gone era but perhaps not a dinosaur.
The director and writers are definitely to blame. Such a weak script and ....well, what about a petition to keep J Lo out of movies all together?
After her performance in Selena she hasn't been in anything that made me think of her acting seriously.
Actually I did have a short stint in the Seventies at some film seminars but as I got more into interior design, art and lighting I had no time for it.
J Lo has had some passable performances after "Selena" but has yet to prove herself as an actress -- a pretty face with an ample posterior perhaps, but not much of an actress.
The way Cary Grant dressed is timeless -- of course, we only saw him in a dress once, or at least a WAC uniform!
hahaha (yes..wasn't he in "I Was Mail Order War Bride?)
Right you are! And with a Dorothy Hamill hairdo!
I miss seeing well dressed men!
It makes me laugh to see a clothing credit at the end of a program like the Dr. Phil Show (he looks like an unmade bed) or for the second host of Antiques Road Show (who wore colored shirts with contrasting collars that never seemed to fit well). Grant always looked great.
I wish we put more emphasis on tailoring. In real life, I remember --and I'm almost 58, so you know how rare they are -- two really beautifully tailored men. One was in the town where I live. I was at the local bookstore, chatting with the then owner who was a friend, when a man walked in to show my friend a birthday present he had bought for his wife. His suit was wonderful! There was a little half cuff on the sleeve and a crispness about it that was marvelous. I told him the suit was beautiful and he really appreciated the compliment. He had bought the suit on Carnaby Street in London in the late 60s and only wore in on special occassions because he knew he would never be able to replace it.
I saw the other beautiful suit in Paris. I had gone to visit my daughter who was then an au pair. She picked me up with a friend who was on her junior year abroad and the three of us had breakfast at Doux Magout (sp?). While we sat on the terrace that lovely April morning (I feel a song coming on), an older man crossed the street just in front of the restaurant. He wore a navy pin stripe suit. Doesn't sound that spectacular, does it? Wrong! It was gorgeous. Surely custom made.
While we're on the subjects of France and tailoring, in the movie, "8 Women," there is one shot over the shoulder of, possibly, Isabelle Adjani. She played a character who began mousy and later evolved into a fashion plate. The tailoring of her suit jacket was out of this world.
Sigh! So much for nice clothes!
The only current movie stars who are snappy dressers I can think of is Jude Law and Pierce Brosnan, both British! Heath Ledger was on the Tonight Show this week and looked as if he just walked in off the street after a bout with the wine bottle.
Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith is opening amidst mostly favorable reviews. It looks like Lucas at last has retruned to the format of grand space opera, abadoning the weak Azimov-style socio-political mumbo jumbo and delivered a film as good as the original and "Empire." Although digital projection is the wave of the future, several theaters in major cities will be showing the digital version. I've not seen digital project and am looking around the OC for a theater which has the equipment.
Here's a link to a starting guide for finding theaters who have digital screens:
http://www.theforce.net/episode3/theaters/digital.asp
Not sure Mr. Pitt and Ms. Jolie are going to be able to deny their off-screen relationship much longer. How many films have you seen where the on-screen chemistry was dynamite and it always ended up the pair in question had a thing going off-screen?
Beginning of Roger Ebert's review of the movie:
Mr. & Mrs. Smith (PG-13)
Jolie, Pitt spark explosive chemistry
There is a kind of movie that consists of watching two people together on the screen. The plot is immaterial. What matters is the "chemistry," a term that once referred to a science but now refers to the heat we sense, or think we sense, between two movie stars. Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have it, or I think they have it, in "Mr. and Mrs. Smith," and because they do, the movie works. If they did not, there'd be nothing to work with.
Balance of review at
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/frontpage
We saw Mr. and Mrs. Smith last night because the new Batman movie was sold out.
The "chemistry" between these two did not help the movie enough. Anyhow, about 1/3 through you could become numb to both violence and the two.
Boring shyt.
It is not a good idea to encourage our youth to think, or even think about thinking, that this sort of life pays off. His and her hit men? An insult to the two. Seemed an extreme War of the Roses, where the two at least died.
Not really new, see Steve McQueen and Ali McGraw in "The Getaway." You mean the violence is more numbing than watching Christ turned into a tenderized minute steak? Somehow I doubt that.
I also really doubt the film would encourage young people to become hitmen anymore than "The Getaway" encouraged them to rob banks. I'm glad you are happy that the two died in the end of "The War of the Roses."
Having seen "Batman Begins," I wouldn't recommend parents to take their kids to see this movie either. It's very complex and dark although I'm sure it's a better movie than "Mr. and Mrs. Smith."
I've had a few days to think about Mr. and Mrs. Smith, and decide why I just became bored with the repetitive hi-tech killings. Some good friends loved it, caught all the clever dialogue.
At some point there didn't seem to be much difference between the two, male & female. Two huge, hard breasts, too puffy lips. The close-ups of Brad Pitt, looks like he has botoxed his jawline, and why are his lips so purplish. No love story at all. However, the dialogue was clever.
Maybe it was just too much crash-bang noise, too much clunking metal, too cold. The dialogue, however, was clever. I know there's violence, more so maybe in the other movies you mention, LW, but this particular movie was just so cold.
That's why critics are often helpful because nearly all the reviews even favorable will likely spell out that this might not be the movie for you. I doubt Brad has Botoxed his jawline (never really heard of a case where that would work, so perhaps you meant cologen injections). Depending on his weight, that jawline is his facial trademark like Angelina's is the fish lips. I doubt I will race to the cineplex to see this one -- I will wait for it to show up on NetFlix or on HBO or Showtime for free.
It is my understanding that the script for Mr and Mrs Smith began as a graduate thesis at a New York film school (NYU?). A critic on NPR wondered how it ever got produced.
