Category Archives: Skip It

“Little pink houses…” Wonderful hometown coverage

1 February 2014

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Thanks to the Columbia City Post & Mail for this feature on the new book!

Columbia City Post & Mail Coverage

Columbia City Post & Mail Coverage

Ann Arbor, Michigan – Roy Sexton’s first book Reel Roy Reviews, Vol. 1: Keepin’ It Real is set for release on the Open Books imprint February 28, 2014. Sexton, a resident of Saline/Ann Arbor, launched his entertainment blog of the same name (www.reelroyreviews.com) on Independence Day in 2012 and, nearly two years later, is a published author.

Reel Roy Reviews, Vol. 1: Keepin’ It Real is a compilation of essays composed in tribute to (and sometimes frustration with) the art-form known as “cinema” —with a few theatre, music, and concert analyses thrown in for good measure. As a populist at heart, Sexton’s sensibility is grounded in a desire to see good stories, well told.

For Sexton, film is an encapsulated medium. Whether 90 minutes or three hours, a movie tells one story—beginning, middle, and end—introducing you to new friends, enemies, and locales in an efficiently designed delivery mechanism. With a good film, Sexton feels you get the experience of reading a novel (whether or not the film is in fact based on any work of literature) in a highly compressed fashion.

Sexton argues that, in the best movie-going experience, your brain leaves your body for a bit, you take a mini-vacation to places you might not otherwise ever see, and you return to your regularly scheduled life a bit changed, perhaps enlightened, and hopefully re-energized.

Sexton notes, “I try to respect that (for the most part) these are show business professionals putting (ideally) their best feet forward and that they are human beings with hearts and souls and feelings. I hope I never seem cruel. I don’t mean to be. These writings are off-the-cuff and journal-style and come from as positive a place as I can muster….Approach everything and everyone honestly and with positive intent and offer candid feedback with an open heart and as much kindness as possible.”

Open Books Technical Editor Kelly Huddleston adds, “Whether he is reviewing August: Osage County or Wreck-It Ralph, Sexton delivers smart and funny reviews sprinkled with clever and thought-provoking insights about modern-day culture. This is not just a book about movie, theatre, music, and concert reviews. Viewed throughout the reels, Reel Roy Reviews, Vol 1: Keepin’ It Real offers a clever and candid social commentary on American life.”

A self-described small town boy who never quite fit in but learned how to survive playground games with a sense of humor, a bit of style, and a love of movies, Sexton, son of Don and Susie Sexton, grew up in Columbia City, Indiana. His mother (www.susieduncansexton.com) is also a published author, whose two essay collections Secrets of an Old Typewriter and More Secrets of an Old Typewriter, are published by Open Books (www.open-bks.com).

Roy earned his Bachelor’s degree from Wabash College in 1995 and is a 1997 graduate of The Ohio State University, where he earned his Master’s degree in Theatre. In 2007, Roy graduated with his MBA from the University of Michigan. He is a graduate of Leadership Detroit, is a governor-appointed member of the Michigan Council of Labor and Economic Growth and was appointed to the Michigan Mortgage Lenders Association Board of Governors in 2012.

Roy has been involved on the following nonprofit boards and committees: First Step, Michigan Quality Council, National MS Society, ASPCA, Wabash College Southeast Michigan Alumni Association, Penny Seats Theatre Company and the Spotlight Players. Sexton is Senior Vice President of Corporate Affairs for Trott & Trott, P.C., a Farmington Hills, Mich.-based real estate law firm.

Prior to joining Trott, Roy spent 10 years in various planning and communications roles at Oakwood Healthcare System, serving as the Corporate Director of Strategic Communications and Planning. In this role he led a staff of 20 marketing professionals and developed the strategic direction for the $1 billion health care system.

Sexton has been an active participant in the local theatre scene for nearly twenty years, having appeared in a number of productions. Sexton most recently had the lead role in Ann Arbor’s Penny Seats production of the Neil Simon/Cy Coleman/Carolyn Leigh musical Little Me, playing seven different characters. He is a co-founder of the theatre company. He was featured as Professor Callahan in Legally Blonde the Musical at Farmington Players, and he played Georg Nowack in She Loves Me with The Penny Seats. He has also appeared in Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet), What Corbin Knew, Oklahoma!, The Pajama Game, Company, Bells are Ringing, Rags, Side by Side by Sondheim, The Taming of the Shrew, Fiddler on the Roof, The Fantasticks, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Ah, Wilderness!, God’s Country, The American Clock, As You Like It, Tartuffe, The Battle of Shallowford, Trout, and The Merchant of Venice. He is also an active cabaret performer.

Sexton notes, “I tend to go see whatever film has been most obnoxiously hyped, marketed, and oversold in any given week…art films? Bah! Won’t find too many of those discussed here. And every once in a while, I may review a TV show, theatrical production, record album, concert, or book (yeah, probably not too many of those either).” Reel Roy Reviews, Vol. 1: Keepin’ It Real will be released on February 28, 2014 and can be pre-ordered (paperback or ebook) at www.open-bks.com. It will also be available after the publication date at Amazon and iTunes.

Coming to a theatre … er … bookstore near you: Reel Roy Reviews, Vol. 1: Keepin’ It Real!

22 January 2014

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The cover! As designed by the wonderful Kelly Huddleston

Coming to a theatre … er … bookstore near you: Reel Roy Reviews, Vol. 1: Keepin’ It Real! Just wanted to let you know the exciting news that this l’il ol’ blog of movie reviews is going to be a book released on February 28. You can find out more at this link: www.open-bks.com/library/moderns/reel-roy-reviews/about-book.html

Click here for additional coverage by BroadwayWorld/BooksWorld!

About the book…

Reel Roy Reviews, Vol. 1: Keepin’ It Real is a compilation of essays composed in tribute to (and sometimes frustration with) the art-form known as “cinema” —with a few theatre, music, and concert analyses thrown in for good measure. As a populist at heart, Sexton’s sensibility is grounded in a desire to see good stories, well told.

For Sexton, film is an encapsulated medium. Whether 90 minutes or three hours, a movie tells one story—beginning, middle, and end—introducing you to new friends, enemies, and locales in an efficiently designed delivery mechanism. With a good film, Sexton feels you get the experience of reading a novel (whether or not the film is in fact based on any work of literature) in a highly compressed fashion.

In the best movie-going experience, your brain leaves your body for a bit, you take a mini-vacation to places you might not otherwise ever see, and you return to your regularly scheduled life a bit changed, perhaps enlightened, and hopefully re-energized.

Sexton notes, “I try to respect that (for the most part) these are show business professionals putting (ideally) their best feet forward and that they are human beings with hearts and souls and feelings. I hope I never seem cruel. I don’t mean to be. These writings are off-the-cuff and journal-style and come from as positive a place as I can muster….Approach everything and everyone honestly and with positive intent and offer candid feedback with an open heart and as much kindness as possible.”

About the author…

Roy Sexton is a small town boy who never quite fit in but learned how to survive playground games with a sense of humor, a bit of style, and a love of movies. He has been blogging at www.reelroyreviews.com for a couple of years now to an audience of … tens of people. He writes, “I tend to go see whatever film has been most obnoxiously hyped, marketed, and oversold in any given week…art films? Bah! Won’t find too many of those discussed here. And every once in a while, I may review a TV show, theatrical production, record album, concert, or book (yeah, probably not too many of those either).”

Sexton aims to make his friends and family suffer through at least one community theatre production with him in it annually; he is a marketer and strategic planner by trade; but he mostly just wants to enjoy life and pop culture, to help our animal friends, and to live and let live.

Sexton, a graduate of Wabash College who also holds an MA in theatre from Ohio State and an MBA from the University of Michigan, resides in Ann Arbor, Michigan, with a cinematically adventurous auto engineer and two amiably neurotic rescue dogs. He is also the son of Susie Duncan Sexton, whose two essay collections Secrets of an Old Typewriter and More Secrets of an Old Typewriter, are published by Open Books.

“Toxic and poisonous choices”: American Hustle

2 January 2014

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[Image Source: Wikipedia]

“Sometimes the toxic and poisonous choices are the only ones available to us,” pontificates Jennifer Lawrence, the one (pseudo) bright spot in David O. Russell’s latest sprawling, shaggy dog, broken soul epic American Hustle.

In my humble opinion, the most toxic choices are those artistic ones made by the actors and their director in this simplistic and disappointing misfire.

Hopelessly miscast age-wise as Christian Bale’s wife (!) and playing a derivative of the same neurotic screwball she took to Oscar-winning glory in last year’s Silver Linings Playbook (also directed by Russell), Lawrence seems to be the only cast member having any fun in the ABSCAM-inspired farce. Her zaniest bit comes at the expense of an ill-fated microwave (dubbed “the science oven”) and an aluminum foil covered tray of lasagna.

Don’t get me wrong – Lawrence is as hammy as the rest of her colleagues (Amy Adams, Christian Bale, Bradley Cooper, and Jeremy Renner) but she has the good sense to keep winking at the camera as she collects her paycheck.

I will tell you plainly: I did not like this movie … at all. And I wonder if I’m missing something, given all the critical fawning over it. Or is David O. Russell now one of those “Emperor’s New Clothes”-style directors who has turned in enough awards-show-bait over the years that he can put together a half-baked cartoon and reap endless accolades? Or maybe I’m just a cynical turd.

With such a rich backdrop as skeezy 70s-era New York, populated by no end of colorful sociopaths and parasites, you’d think Russell could have given us a Scorcese-level master class in ensemble betrayals, double-crosses, and deception. Alas, we get a mess of Altman-lite overlapping improv, corny Studio 54 cast-off costuming, and a confusing script that barely scratches the surface of the ABSCAM scandal, padding out underwritten scenes with overdone montages set to cliched Me Decade tunes. Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, indeed.

(And, yes, even America’s goony ditty “Horse with No Name” makes its requisite appearance. Poor song.)

Yeah, I know. We should have known better … the sequel: Tyler Perry’s A Madea Christmas

15 December 2013

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[Image Source: Wikipedia]

Well, when I started this adventure called Reel Roy Reviews a little over a year and a half ago, my first review – perhaps just to telegraph to readers how few standards I had – was of Tyler Perry’s Madea’s Witness Protection Program. No lie – proof here.

As if to come (shamefacedly) full circle at this holly jolly holiday time of reflection and penance, this fifty-eighth (!) entry in my weird, lightly trafficked corner of blogdom highlights Tyler Perry’s A Madea Christmas. And, yeah, we still should have known better. It is just dreadful.

(Tyler Perry, that dollar store indie-auteur, is helping me formulate a new supposition: the more possessive apostrophes in a film’s title, the worse the cinematic outcome.)

Perry is no dummy. His bread and butter is Madea, and, as poorly (under)written as his scripts are and as shoddy as his direction, that character – a loving (and honest) homage to his mother – remains the bright spot in the Perry universe. As broadly as she is drawn (sometimes spinning perilously into full-blown cultural offense), Madea as a characterization, I would argue, belongs in the cinematic canon of franchise comedy series players like Abbott and Costello, Ma and Pa Kettle, or Francis the Talking Mule.

Strange company, I realize, but when Perry is firing on all saucy cylinders, his Madea transcends the sub-par narrative context in which she’s placed and can make me laugh like a kid watching Laurel and Hardy reruns on a rainy Saturday afternoon. It’s just too bad Perry as a filmmaker doesn’t know his limitations – imagine if Hal Roach thought he was Ingmar Bergman.

This brings us to Perry’s latest – A Madea Christmas – which is one of his weakest efforts to date. He bears the remarkable distinction of actually getting worse as a filmmaker the more movies he directs.

As an aside, the high-water mark for the series (which isn’t saying much) remains Madea Goes to Jail, which leverages Madea’s ongoing rage at the cosmic ineptitude of mankind to great effect, most notably during a run-in in a Kmart parking lot. Madea Goes to Jail also has the good sense to include Viola Davis (at a time before we all realized how amazing she is) in one of Perry’s trademark melodramatic subplots: some nonsense about Rudy from The Cosby Show becoming a drug addicted prostitute … and then finding Jesus. Davis, whose actorly commitment could make an episode of Full House bearable, plays the prison counselor that gets Rudy (and Madea) back on track and offers one of the rare instances of a compelling character-driven performance in a Perry film.

A Madea Christmas on the other hand features the magical acting chops of … Larry the Cable Guy. And he’s one of the most subdued (and funny) people in this mess. Color me astounded. Kathy Najimy (who should fire her agent) and Larry play liberals-in-rednecks’-clothing whose son secretly marries Madea’s niece. Madea, of course, is fine with all of it, as long as she gets to crack wise and crack heads. The girl’s mother, histrionically played by Anna Maria Horsford as if she thinks the movie’s audience is located somewhere on the moon, is less than thrilled by her daughter’s choice of life mate. Bad 1980s TV movie hijinks ensue.

There’s a bizarre subplot about a dam that has cut off water from the town and is robbing the hateful farmers there of crop-growing potential; a Christmas pageant sponsored by the conglomerate that built said dam and that now wants to deprive the town of their “Christ in Christmas” by making the event a non-denominational “Holiday” pageant (with no – gasp! – nativity); and a school that apparently is located right inside the town hall (!), has six students, and is run by sweet-faced principal Lisa Whelchel (yeah, The Facts of Life‘s Blair) whose notion of the separation of church and state is decorating her classrooms with Christmas-light-festooned crosses. It’s like Sam Walton’s fever-dream.

Mr. Perry, I implore you – take some time off. Cranking out two movies a year does not a great director make. Assess what you do well (fish-out-of-water comedy, class warfare satire) and what you don’t (poignant melodrama, humanist messages) and be brave enough to let someone else … anyone else … direct you (as Madea) in one of your scripts. That would be the best holiday gift of all to those moviegoers (like yours truly) who keep waiting (but probably not for much longer) for you fully to realize your potential.

There is nothin’ like a dame…who deserves a better movie: Philomena

1 December 2013

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Is it strange that I prefer my Judi Dench (DAME Judi Dench, if you’re nasty) shaken and not stirred? I wish they hadn’t killed her off last year in Skyfall so I could anticipate her next round of icily maternal spy-mastering and forget the dreck that is Philomena.

OK, this British tragicomic trifle isn’t that bad but it ain’t that good either.

I had high hopes for this one as I always enjoy Dench (she could read the phone book for all I care) as, unlike some UK thespians, she cuts through the pretense and offers her perfect cadence, crisp diction, and profound stares in an earthy and relatable way.

Pairing her with the reliably wry and delightful Steve Coogan (see: Hamlet 2 … no, really, see Hamlet 2 … right now!) seems inspired. And, while I’m not much a fan of director Stephen Frears – whose movies just seem scruffily overwrought to me, The Queen notwithstanding – he is a workmanlike director whom I assumed would be wise enough to just wind his actors up and start the cameras rolling.

All that said, Dench and Coogan are just fine, but the script is sorely lacking. This would have been a marvelous hour-long holiday special teleplay on Masterpiece Theatre or something, but as a nearly 2-hour film, the thin material is stretched to its breaking point. Dench and Coogan look quite bored for about a third of the film, to be honest – and so was I.

The plot, as it is, concerns a young girl in 1950s Ireland who finds herself “in the family way” as they say and is slapped in a nunnery to have the child, endure assorted abuses, do a lot of the nuns’ laundry (yeah…really), and then have her toddler torn from her arms and sent to America to live with a wealthy couple. Flash forward to the present, said toddler now would be 50 years old, and Dench is hellbent to find him and finally meet him, with the assistance of recently “sacked” journalist Coogan.

This sets up what is arguably the dullest road trip on film. (I kept hoping for them to cross paths with The Guilt Trip‘s much funnier though critically maligned duo Barbra Streisand and Seth Rogen, but, alas, no.) Coogan and Dench go to America, have some funny exchanges on the back of an airport go-cart thing, have some more fish-out-of-water interactions at the hotel omelette station, and then find her son … via the INTERNET (?!?!). They couldn’t have accomplished that remaining in merry old England?

Then they episodically interview a number of folks with whom her son had interacted over the years, get some sad news (which I won’t spoil), chase down some more people, and then race back to England for a throw down with the nuns who treated Dench so shabbily. THAT last part I enjoyed, and it’s the moment when Coogan finally comes alive with that wild-eyed, exasperated, ticked off Brit thing he does so well.

The movie traffics in a few horrendous mid-90s cliches and attempts to say some deep things about gender, age, class, and faith, but it all comes off as a pencil sketch of a movie that could have been so much more.

I did very much enjoy the movie’s point of view that the intent and the reality of organized religion couldn’t be farther from one another, yet there was nothing groundbreaking nor bold in the telling. Cruel and hypocritical people use the umbrella of the church to get their jollies doing cruel and hypocritical things in the name of “morality.” Irritates the living daylights out of me but I would rather watch a movie tackle that pernicious issue in a stronger, more confident manner.

I seem to be saying this a lot lately, but these actors deserve a much better film. You can plaster “based on a true story” on any flick, but, if the proceedings aren’t compelling, well-written, or thoughtful, you may as well just pick up a copy of Reader’s Digest and save yourself a trip to the theatre.

Why are we ashamed of our fairy tales? Disney’s Frozen

28 November 2013

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In this post-Wicked era, we seem to be ashamed of our fairy tales. Everything has to be postmodern, postfeminist, postmillennial, postfun … and titles we used to know and love need to be replaced by edgy (and meaningless) adjectives.

For example, Rapunzel is now Tangled. Today, Snow White would be Pale or Cinderella would be Shoeless or Sleeping Beauty would be Snoozy. Hence, now The Snow Queen is called Frozen. And it’s a bore.

I really wanted to like this. I love Disney animated movies, and I love musicals … and I adore Disney animated musicals. But not this one.

With the pedigree that this film has – from the creators of The Book of Mormon and Avenue Q (which I admit does seem like a bit of a stretch for Disney) providing the music and Pixar’s John Lasseter producing – I had high hopes. I also think The Snow Queen is a fascinating (and weird) story to adapt. Plus, you have voice work from Broadway’s Idina Menzel, Jonathan Groff, and Josh Gad as well as TV star Kristen Bell.

Sadly, the film is dead on arrival. The musical numbers are forgettable – completely. And the storyline is so far afield from the familiar narrative, bolting on, yes, a Wicked-esque sisterly rivalry that adds little. And, I will admit it, I still miss hand-drawn animation. I know 2D is basically gone forever, but this computer-generated business where everyone looks like a glassy-eyed Bratz doll is for the birds.

There are folks out there who loved Disney’s Hunchback of Notre Dame with its singing and dancing gargoyles and creepy, oversexed, misogynistic clergy villain. I’m not one of them. And I kept thinking of that misfire while watching Frozen. The plot is similarly disjointed, and I just couldn’t get too geeked about musical numbers featuring rastafarian rock trolls and goony snowmen.

I wish I had more to say. I’m fresh out of clever. There’s an interesting twist in the film’s final act that helped me engage a bit, but at that point the movie had already lost me. There will be people who – on their Thanksgiving holiday high – will adore this, and they will likely tell me “you just didn’t get it” and “you are thinking about it too much.”

Well, I like thinking. And the Disney classics of old weren’t devoid of thought. In fact, they were rich with it. Frozen left me uninspired and bored to icy tears.

“Satisfaction is not exactly my strong suit…” Thor: The Dark World

10 November 2013

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[Image Source: Wikipedia]

I hate it when I’m so excited about a movie, and it ends up just dull. I almost would rather it be a crash-and-burn disaster (see: Green Lantern) ’cause then at least I can get the church pew giggles about how godawful it is. Alas, Thor: The Dark World is neither fabulously fun nor campily tragic…just stinkily tedious.

I’m a comic book nerd – I make my loved ones suffer through all kinds of crappy flicks (see: Ghost Rider…BOTH of ’em). However, the first Thor, directed by no less than SIR Kenneth Branagh was a delight, balancing the majesty of Norse mythology with some zippy fish-out-of-water humor as lumbering Thor made his way through Midgard (that would be Earth to us mere mortals) tripping over all of our clunky technology and superstitious ways.

Unfortunately, the jokes in this follow-up are pretty much non-existent – other than cute, quirky sitcom actor Kat Dennings doing her cute, quirky sitcom thing in her Jimmy Olsen-esque sidekick gig. (There is a nice, witty moment toward the film’s tail end between Thor, his hammer, and a coat-rack … but that would be about it.)

As a result, the film ends up ponderous and stultifying. The majority of the movie is spent in Asgard itself, which now unfortunately looks like a Thomas Kinkade CGI take on The Lord of the Rings’ elf castle place where pointy-eared Cate Blanchett and Hugo Weaving stood around glowing … but I digress.

Heaven help the actors here – Idris Alba, Anthony Hopkins, Rene Russo, Chris Hemsworth do the best they can with some high falutin’ faux Shakespearean dialogue about Norse history, royal intrigue, and some floaty ether that can blow up the “Nine Realms” (whatever those are). Of course,  Tom Hiddleston as Loki gets all the best lines … or knows best how to deliver the groaners with which the cast is saddled. He is a mercurial delight, at one point intoning, “Satisfaction is not exactly my strooooong suit,” looking as bored as I was at that point in the proceedings.

The less said about Natalie Portman as Thor’s love interest the better – or Stellan Skarsgard as her kooky scientist pal for that matter. Both made me cringe every time they were on screen. Could someone please encourage early retirement for them both?

Marvel/Disney, I’ve got an idea for the inevitable sequel. Call it Loki: The Only Interesting One, and just follow Hiddleston around as he shops at Target, goes to the theatre, rescues stray dogs, and takes a nap. That would be an infinitely more engaging film. Don’t believe me? Check out this cute clip.

Never trust a movie with a colon in the title … The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones

24 August 2013

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Yeah, I wanted to see The Butler. I still want to see The Butler. Tonight, I did not see The Butler.

Nope, instead, I saw The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones. Yup, you read that sentence correctly. Any film that has that many cryptically ominous words AND a colon in the title is truly as bad as it sounds. At least we still have truth in some advertising, regardless how inadvertent. Cold comfort.

When will this turgid phase of young “adult” fiction-turned-cinematic tripe finally pass like the hastily consumed, calorically empty fast food dinner it is? (I apologize for the colorful, though apt, metaphor.) Whom do I get blame for these movies? Harry Potter? Edward and Bella? Dawson’s Creek? Oy.

I’m not sure what to say about this one. Simply put, this film stole two and a half hours of my life that I’ll never get back. (The trailers beforehand weren’t even interesting. Another adaptation of what I personally view as Shakespeare’s least interesting work, Romeo and Juliet? With Paul Giamatti?!? Really?!)

After the movie, my friends and I spoke at length about movies and tv shows that move us to tears (in a good way). The chat had nothing to do with this film, but we had it nonetheless. You want to know what made me cry about this film … other than the colossal waste of production time and money it represented?

I’ll tell you what made me cry…that THIS is the way Hollywood chooses to use the brilliant Jared Harris as he moons around like an angsty, tattooed version of his father Richard’s last role Dumbledore (which also was kind of a crime against humanity and art, but not as bad as this).

CCH Pounder, also a terrific actor, is relegated to Viola Davis’ mystic sci-fi blockbuster cast-offs as some spooky voodoo witch landlord who, at the film’s midpoint, turns into a strange hybrid of Lord of the Rings’ Golem and Whoopi Goldberg’s character from Ghost.

Oh, and our hero? The darling Lily Collins, so charming in the underrated though clunky Mirror Mirror, borrows heavily from the Kristen Stewart balsa wood school of acting while bringing a smidge of Annette Funicello’s furrowed brow and Kate Beckinsale’s leather/lycra-wearing-demon-slaying contortions. What the h*ll?

This movie is a mess. I don’t think it would even make it through pilot season on The CW. And they’ll put anything on the air.

The plot? What plot. Something about a girl born with some sort of magical powers to kill werewolves or vampires or demons while befriending angels and lurking about spooky old museum/castle locations in what appeared to be the Manhattan of 1984’s Ghostbusters. Oh, and poor Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Lena Headey, and Jamie Campbell Bower show up to collect a paycheck and act out some portentous nonsensical mystical hoo-ha.

Yup, could have been watching The Butler. Instead, saw a movie with bad CGI, worse dialogue, and a colon in the title.

Here’s hoping when I finally see The Butler, Jane Fonda and Oprah don’t suddenly turn into mopey vampire-slayers.

Until you are ready to shove popcorn in your ears: Seven Psychopaths

21 October 2012

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I should preface this review of director Martin McDonagh’s latest film Seven Psychopaths by admitting that I have never given into the cult of actor Sam Rockwell. He has bubbled under the radar in a number of indie films over the past 15 years, and many have succumbed to his smarmy, winky, “isn’t life ridiculous,” Gen X charms. Alas, I am not one of those fawning fans. (The first time I ever suffered through him was in his shuffling, toothpick-chewing, pseudo-villain role in Charlie’s Angels ten years ago, and, to my mind, he has been recycling the same schtick ever since.)

Conversely, I long ago gave into the cult of Christopher Walken, who, like Rockwell, also pretty much gives the same performance in every film. In Walken’s case, though, it is a wide-eyed, acerbic, halting, wackadoodle, “life. is. ridiculous” delivery that I find charming. Why the hypocrisy on my part? I can only ascribe it to this: Rockwell’s self-indulgence is always in service to Rockwell; Walken’s self-indulgence is in service to the script.

With that paradigm in mind, it should come as no surprise that Seven Psychopaths worked best for me in those quiet, gentle moments when Walken – playing a reformed, Quaker (!) revenge killer who now kidnaps/returns dogs for reward money – interacts with his dear, cancer-stricken wife or his criminal cohorts as mayhem otherwise ensues. And, similarly unsurprising, the film falls apart for me in the final act when it is all about Rockwell’s character staging some sort of zany cinematic gunfight standoff with Woody Harrelson, a gangland thug who just wants his Shih Tzu returned. (This is all done while Rockwell sports an ever-so-dear, bear-shaped knit hat…and THAT would be the kind of twee, self-indulgent touch I mean.)

What is the film about exactly? I’m not sure. I suspect it was meant to be some kind of postmodern meditation on a culture whose warped idea of manhood is all about guns and violence and posturing to the detriment of meaningful human interaction. There are some fine and funny moments throughout with a great supporting cast. Harrelson is a joy as he continues to ride a career resurgence as a witty character-actor, and Tom Waits is spectacular as one of the psychopaths in question, who simply pines for the return of his long, lost love while petting his white fluffy rabbit (literally). However, the script seems to have been written by committee as if every goofy Quentin Tarantino-esque cliche was tossed into a blender, and I guess I just didn’t quite understand the point.

A few final observations. First, I didn’t know how I would stand the dog kidnapping angle, but I will say the film/actors were so sweet-natured about it and Walken is so heartfelt and dear that it ended up oddly charming.  Second, I’m not sure when Colin Farrell crossed over to achieving a likable, decent acting presence, but I enjoyed him and his reactions to the film’s random acts of absurdity. He kept the shenanigans nicely grounded. Finally, my mom once said about the theme song to Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, “It has such a pretty melody…but it is ruined by the need to shoehorn the words ‘beauty’ and ‘beast’ into the chorus.” The same is true of this movie – by the fifth time the word “psychopath” is invoked by one of the characters, it just sounds silly…by the twentieth, if not thirtieth, you are ready to shove popcorn in your ears.