Tag: Robert Downey Jr.

Movie Round-Up: April 24th, 2009

Reviews

Fighting:

This is the only movie opening this week that I have seen, and I wish I hadn’t.  I’d seen the trailer and I was actually interested in seeing this one, but it just didn’t live up.  Every actor in this film, without exception, has given better performances.  With the exception of one scene this movie lacked emotion, and never made me care about any of the characters.  Largely this is because they did so little to make me want to care.  Why is this kid from Alabama in New York? Don’t worry, they don’t tell you.  Why is there animosity between the street hustlers?  Don’t worry, they don’t tell you.  Most of the movie just feels random and messy and filled with bad dialogue.  The fight scenes are fairly well done those, so kudos to the fight choreographer, but just not worth the money to see in the theater.

Obsessed:

In my opinion, Beyonce is a horrible actress.  She makes every movie she is in worse by simply being in it.  The wife and I have been having fun trying to guess what the twist in this film is going to be.  I will, however, wait until I can watch it for free or something.  I will not encourage Beyonce to continue acting.

The Soloist:

I think Robert Downey Jr. is a great actor.  I’ve never been very interested in Jamie Foxx.  So I’m torn.  Being a drama though, and one that might likely make me shed man-tears (the rarest and sweetest kind), I just don’t have much desire to see this on the big screen.  But it will definitely make it into the rental queue on Netflix.

Tropic Thunder

Reviews

10 out of 13 nots.
for kicking Hollywood in the gonads

I am sure by now, unless you live under a rock, you have heard about the controversy surrounding Tropic Thunder.  Ben Stiller’s character of Tugg Speedman portrayed a mentally disabled boy in a movie called Simple Jack.  Yes, the character of Jack is rife with stereotypes of the cognitively challenged… but that’s sort of the point.  Tugg took the part of Jack in a blatant attempt to show that he was more than an action star and to try to nab Oscar gold.  Tropic Thunder is not about Jack, its about Tugg, who himself is a stereotypical action star, doing what we, the audience, already consider to be fairly tasteless (blatant Oscar bid films) and taking it to the extreme.  Much the same way that Robert Downey Jr.’s Kirk Lazarus is taking actors who physically transform themselves for their craft to the extreme (he gets his skin dyed so that he, a white actor, can portray a black man).  Every character in the film is a caricature of people who exist in the real Hollywood, and it is really funny.

However, to every person out there… this movie is rated R for a reason.  Take it seriously.  And its not just for the swearing (of which there is a lot), or the blood and gore (or which there is plenty), or nudity (which there isn’t any, unless you count Jack Black in his underwear), it is also because, unless you are a person who can discern the difference between a joke and not a joke (like, for instance, kids), this movie might be extremely offensive… to everyone.  But hey, if you can take a joke, and if you can separate having a laugh from having a world outlook, this movie is a hoot.

Of course, we could always ban jokes about the mentally disabled… and other disabled people… and blacks, and jews, and fat people, and skinny people, and business people, and homeless people, and normal people.  We could ban all those jokes… but then all we would have left are knock-knock jokes, and not very many of those at that.  Remember, for every movie you think isn’t funny, there is a movie you think is hilarious that someone else thinks isn’t funny.  Even Finding Nemo makes fun of people who have memory problems…