Tag Archives: arrested development

Kids behaving badly: Bad Words

29 March 2014

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Description: Film poster; Source: Wikipedia [linked]; Portion used: Film poster only; Low resolution? Sufficient resolution for illustration, but considerably lower resolution than original. Other information: Intellectual property by film studio. Non-free media use rationales: Non-free media use rationale - Article/review; Purpose of use: Used for purposes of critical commentary and illustration in an educational article about the film. The poster is used as the primary means of visual identification of this article topic. Replaceable? Protected by copyright, therefore a free use alternative won't exist.

[Image Source: Wikipedia]

I have soft spot in my soul for the naughty movie with a heart of gold.

The Holy Grails of such films for me are Bad Santa and Bridesmaids. And if I were plotting a trilogy, Jason Bateman’s first directorial effort Bad Words would be right there alongside them.

I freaking loved this movie.

Let me add that I am not a Jason Bateman fan. He reminds me of boys that weren’t very nice to me in junior high – all preppy swagger and snark. However, this film has made me turn 180 degrees on that assessment. He’s plenty snide in this flick, but I’m guessing that he too was one of the picked on, given the surety and sensitivity and sharpness with which he approaches this material.

The concept (one that can only make sense in the logic bubble that is Hollywood film-making) is that a 40-year-old proofreader (Bateman again) can enter the “Golden Quill” spelling bee competition via one loophole: anyone who has not completed school past the 8th grade is eligible. (It’s never explained how Bateman has a seemingly successful career yet never passed beyond middle school, but whatever.)

Bateman’s character Guy Trilby has some hidden agenda for why he is so hellbent to not only enter the bee at local and regional levels but to win at the national level. We learn bits and pieces through the course of the film as Trilby is trailed by a web journalist (and sometime paramour) – played brilliantly by nebbishy Kathryn Hahn (a near doppelganger for Saturday Night Live alum Ana Gasteyer) – who unearths aspects of his past as the film proceeds.

Bateman has cast his film to perfection, including the always wonderful Allison Janney as the spelling bee’s anal-retentive national director, Rachael Harris as a belligerent bee-parent, and Philip Baker Hall as a the Golden Quill’s paterfamilias.

The heart and soul of the film, though, comes in the form of newcomer Rohan Chand as Trilby’s 10-year-old sidekick/rival. Yes, the scenes of the 40-year-old and 10-year-old painting the town red are comically shocking but also wildly endearing. Say what you will about Bateman, but he telegraphs arrested development beautifully (no pun intended given that he starred on a TV show with the same name), with his boyish charm, elfin features, and boys-will-be-boys attitude. As a result, the friendship that blossoms between these two puckish naturals is a whimsical delight (rivaling what Billy Bob Thornton accomplished in the aforementioned Bad Santa).

I suppose, given the fact that I subjected myself to foolish pageantry like spelling bees and speech tournaments in my youth, I had a predilection to identify more with this film. But Batemen nailed the hothouse insanity of pitting 10-year-olds against 10-year-olds over something as innocuous as spelling words. Indeed, Bateman’s Trilby is cutthroat in his desire to take down any kid in his path (there were a few gags that made me squirm unnecessarily). However, trust me, kids do that to kids … what makes it ironic (and d*mn funny) is that we are now seeing a 40-year-old man engage in such juvenile shenanigans.

With this film, Bateman announces himself as a directorial presence. He displays a nuance that many directors never achieve – he walks a fine line between smart-aleck and empathy. And the results are utterly charming and blisteringly caustic. I will be first in the queue for his next effort.

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Reel Roy Reviews is now a book! Please check out this coverage from BroadwayWorld of upcoming book launch events. In addition to online ordering at Amazon or from the publisher Open Books, the book currently is being carried by Bookbound, Common Language Bookstore, and Crazy Wisdom Bookstore and Tea Room in Ann Arbor, Michigan; by Green Brain Comics in Dearborn, Michigan; and by Memory Lane Gift Shop in Columbia City, Indiana. Bookbound and Memory Lane both also have copies of Susie Duncan Sexton’s Secrets of an Old Typewriter series.

 

“Destroy anything that’s different…” The Lego Movie

8 February 2014

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Description: Film poster; Source: Wikipedia [linked]; Portion used: Film poster only; Low resolution? Sufficient resolution for illustration, but considerably lower resolution than original. Other information: Intellectual property by film studio. Non-free media use rationales: Non-free media use rationale - Article/review; Purpose of use: Used for purposes of critical commentary and illustration in an educational article about the film. The poster is used as the primary means of visual identification of this article topic. Replaceable? Protected by copyright, therefore a free use alternative won't exist.

[Image Source: Wikipedia]

“Destroy anything that’s different,” exclaims one of the ubiquitous yellow-faced citizens of The Lego Movie‘s Orwellian-metropolis Bricksburg … employing such a chipper voice that he may as well be ordering a $37 cup of coffee or watching a mindlessly mind-numbing sitcom (which, by the way, he does).

This is how the deftly satirical “kiddie movie” opens, with the peppy denizens of a perfectly ordered society (constructed from little plastic bricks) extolling the virtues of conformity and their brain-dead escapist indulgences (like instruction manuals, caffeinated beverages, and reality TV).

As this gonzo movie opened, I wondered for a moment if I was watching Toy Story … or South Park. The Lego Movie, directed with sharp wit and a kind heart by Phil Lord and Chris Miller (Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs), has both worlds in its DNA, along with bits of Wreck-It Ralph, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, The Wizard of Oz, Star Wars, Pink Floyd’s The Wall, and the granddaddy of “toys that come to life and teach us important life lessons” flicks Raggedy Ann and Andy’s Musical Adventure. However, it never feels derivative for a second.

With a hero’s quest screenplay that seems like it was written by Joseph Campbell on crack, the movie details the journey of a lowly schlubb named Emmett (Chris Pratt) who revels in the petty details of his mundane, ordered, predictable life but who also can’t avoid the empty ache of loneliness. One thing leads to another, including finding a magic brick (the cutely named “Piece of Resistance”) that will inspire creativity and save the day from the villainous Lord Business (Will Ferrell), a shameless capitalist who spends his days plotting how to keep all the Lego-heads busy and bored and static.

Along the way, as in all such narratives, Emmett is joined by a ragtag group of allies – Wyldstyle (saucy Elizabeth Banks), Vitruvius (wizened yet whimsical Morgan Freeman), Batman (a very funny and very vain Will Arnett who nearly steals the show), and assorted other residents of the bottom of the toy bin (including an adorable cat/unicorn hybrid named Uni-Kitty that captured my heart … darn you, Alison Brie!). Oh, and Liam Neeson is a comic delight as a quite literal “good cop/bad cop” who chases our intrepid heroes all about Legoworld.

The plot is intentionally inconsequential and dripping with juvenilia (by design), all as set-up for a reveal that is a telling critique of our arrested development era. I don’t want to spoil it (though I think anyone over 12-years-old will see it coming), but the filmmakers offer a spot-on (though never mean-spirited) critique of adults (like yours truly) who can’t let go of the playthings of their youth but who have also put those material goods on such a pedestal they have forgotten what made those items special and treasured in the first place.

In this transformative moment, we see who we are (and shouldn’t be) today: a society that prizes ironic sentiment over real-time connection, materialistic perfection over messy emotion.

The movie zaps our middle-class, cookie-cutter lifestyle where everyone loves the same song, the same drinks, the same clothes, the same rules and where everyone overuses the word “awesome” to nauseatingly hyperbolic levels. In fact, the characters are lulled, as if by the Greek Sirens of yore, by an ear-wormy disco cheer-anthem (written by Devo’s Mark Mothersbaugh) that infinitely repeats the chorus “Everything is Awesome.” The Lego Movie, an incisive allegory disguised in the Trojan Horse of a children’s film, seems to caution, “If everything is awesome, then nothing truly is.”