Spring Break Movie Review: It’s A WIN WIN!

As the More is More Mom®, I’m all about………more entertaining movies over spring break! While the kids are away, the parents can play. We are a movie loving people, but with a busy family that needs to be driven here, or would like to have 6 friends over for dinner there, it can be nearly impossible to eak out time to head over to the Cineplex. Faced with a little free time, Chuck and I whipped out the movie section of the Sunday paper to check out what was playing on the big screen.

I really owed Chuck big after asking him to sit through The Black Swan. He is a good sport of mammoth proportion, because after all of that acclaim, Black Swan was a real stinker. No, this time, I had to pick a winner. I was so disappointed after perusing the selections. There was virtually nothing good to see. I was kind of up for Paul with Simon Pegg (of Run, Fatboy, Run fame), but that seems more like a movie that we might enjoy with Nick, as it is from the same makers as Superbad. If we had a little one in tow, I would totally have seen Rango, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, or Gnomeo and Juliet, but, alas, we were childless. There were a few extremely dumb looking teenie-bopper movies (a great big NO THANKS. Somehow I have managed never to have seen High School Musical I, II or III. No reason I should backslide now).

How incredibly disappointing! The only movies left were Limitless with Bradley Cooper. I didn’t like him in The Wedding Crashers because he was mean to Vince Vaughn, so that kind of ruins him for me in other movies. Plus, his character was despicable in He’s Just Not That Into You. After I heard Matthew “Do you want me to take my shirt off?” Mc Conaughey remark in an interview that he hadn’t been in the courtroom since A Time To Kill,  it made me have no interest in seeing his latest legal drama, The Lincoln Lawyer. I thought, “You do know you’re not actually an attorney, don’t you?” Clearly you are smoking way too much….cannabis. Then there was Matt Damon’s The Adjustment Bureau, but I’m more of a Ben Affleck gal. Ben was great in The Town and you can see it in the comfort of your own home now On Demand.

 

The one movie that I did want to see was WIN WIN with Paul Giamatti, but it was only playing in three theaters in the entire Chicago-land area! Normally, this would be a real deal breaker for us, but since we are home alone, with no one to consider but ourselves, we decided….Road Trip.

WIN WIN is the delightful story of a down on his luck attorney, Mike Flaherty (Paul Giamatti), who also happens to be the coach a fledgling high school wrestling team. Through a series of events, a young boy named Kyle (played beautifully by new comer Alex Shaffer) comes into the Flaherty’s lives, where Mike and his wife Jackie (Amy Ryan) welcome him into their home. As they help him sort out his troubles, they discover that Kyle is an amazing wrestler who joins Mike’s team. Kyle’s arrival makes an interesting impact on all of their lives. Both Jeffrey Tambor (who makes me cringe) and Bobby Cannavele (who played Vince, Will’s boy friend, On Will and Grace, and is darling) costar. WIN WIN is a total feel good that was absolutely worth the drive into the city (and paying for parking)!!

More road trips, more free time, more popcorn, more great movies……        

Long Live the King!

 

As the More is More Mom®, I’m all about……….more Academy Award nominated movies! The Oscar’s are my very favorite television program of the entire year (I’m such a life-long fan that I didn’t even mind Rob Lowe’s disastrous duet with Snow White). With only two weeks to go until “show-time” I hope to squeeze in as many Best Picture nominated films as possible.

This weekend, while Amanda and her pal saw Justin Bieber’s Never Say Never-3D, Chuck and I snuck in a matinee of The King’s Speech. I’m not normally a Merchant and Ivory, Masterpiece Theater kind of a gal. That’s just way too intellectual for my pea brain to process. Give me a good, fast talking and glib Vince Vaughn; I go weak in the knees. However, from the moment I saw the preview (the Coming Attractions are one of the very best parts of the movie going experience) for The King’s Speech, I knew it was going to be amazing.

I must say it was refreshing to see Helena Bonham Carter in something other than a ghoulish Tim Burton movie. She was wonderful as Queen Elizabeth I; devoted, supportive, insightful and encouraging.

Now, because of my extreme affinity for pop culture and short attention span, I’m most familiar with Geoffrey Rush as Barbossa in the swashbuckling Pirates of the Caribbean and the dark (of course it’s dark; it’s a Coen brother’s picture) Intolerable Cruelty. I had no doubts that Geoffrey Rush was an incredible actor, but he amazing as the speech therapist, Lionel Logue, in The King’s Speech.

Radio was becoming a formidable and viable form of communication prior to the onset of World War II, and became a popular way for the King to reach the masses. Prince Albert “Bertie”, The Duke of York, was terrified of speaking in public, nearly paralyzed, due to his life-long stammer. After seeing every renowned specialist in England, Bertie’s wife, the future Queen Elizabeth, enlists the aid of the innovative Lionel Logue. Throwing convention to the wind, Lionel Logue was able to connect with the King, befriend him and provide him with the tools to overcome his stammer. Geoffrey Rush was incredible in his portrayal, certainly an Academy Award winning performance, though my vote will go to Christian Bale in The Fighter (there’s still time if you haven’t seen it!).

Again, I’m a little light on highbrow movie going experiences, though I’ve found Colin Firth absolutely delightful in The Bridget Jones Diaries, Love Actually and of course, Mama Mia. And let’s not forget the Amanda Bynes classic What a Girl Wants. I know he’s portrayed Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice and other smarty pants movies, I just didn’t happen to see them. However, as Prince Albert, Colin Firth was mesmerizing. Never one for a loss of words myself, I was nearly speechless as he conveyed the pain and embarrassment of his stammer. Bertie’s story, the dedication and lengths he went to in order to overcome his fear and lead his nation during its darkest days, was nothing short of inspirational. Colin Firth absolutely has my vote for Best Actor in a Motion Picture.     

With 10 Best Picture nominated films, I’m not sure I’ll get to them all, though I know I’ll have fun trying.

More movies, more popcorn, more stolen moments, more inspirational stories……