critically acclaimed

three movie round-up

so it was a nice long movie weekend for me and the girl. i hadn't seen a movie in theaters for probably a month or more which is sad for me. so basically to celebrate our anniversary we hit up the theaters hardcore this weekend with two movies i really wanted to see and another i was a little less excited for. but for now i'll start at the beginning.

The Last Kiss

so i had high hopes for this movies because 1. i love zach braff 2. i loved Garden State 3. i love the off kilter romantic dramedies about love and heartbreak. needless to say the movie wasn't amazing but i enjoyed it enough to have a good time with it. the whole movie centers around Braff who plays a near 30 Architect who has the perfect girlfriend and the perfect life but then throws it away by being with a younger girl played by Rachel Bilson. Braff makes the whole movie his and honestly this guy is talented, regardless of the argument that he plays the same character in every movie. this kind of schtick works for me and i like the way they show that relationships are fragile and complicated and not cookie cutter. it has it's moments of weakness and some character's supposed development really falters in a lot of places. there is a lot of promise here though and i can see where they were trying to go with the picture but i didn't quite make it there. it really is Garden State 2 but it trys to not be that at the same time. see Garden State it's better but i enjoyed this one nonetheless.

Little Miss Sunshine

this was the movie that i was most excited to see and pissed off that i haven't seen it earlier than this past weekend. right now this is my top movie of the year, which unfortunately isn't saying squat. i was already in a bad mood and this just lightened things up drastically. everything about this movie just works from the self-deprecating Uncle played by Steve Carell to the self help jackass-guru played by Greg Kinnear. but with all the comedy and inane banter aside the standout role by far is Amber Breslin who plays Olive. her spot on performance as the sweet wholesome inner-beauty queen contestant made my heart just melt. also the best quote of the year goes to the heroin snorting dad played by Alan Arkin. when giving advice to his grandson all he says is "Fuck a lot of women" and then proceeds to banter on for 5 minutes about him getting pussy. and then when Olive asks him what they are talking about he simply says "Politics" best 5 minutes on screen all year. see it now.

The Illusionist

so this was the one film that i wanted to see but wasn't super excited about. but i have to say it was a pretty good film. a lot of the illusions that were presented were pretty textbook and the twist ending wasn't all that surprising to me. Ed Norton does a great job and Paul Giamatti tries his best at being the manipulative and questioning investigator. all in all i wasn't overly impressed. it was good don't get me wrong but i don't think it was something i hadn't seen before. i think that it took everything good about action/drama movies and threw it all in a blender. sometimes things come out right and sometimes they don't. this one did but it still tastes kind of like vanilla to me. same old same old but that isn't always bad.

well that's the breakdown for the week. more to come on the horizon as we start the Oscar wars soon into October. otherwise it has still been a mediocre year with my top movies looking like this: Little Miss Sunshine, V for Vendetta, Clerks 2, and Talledega Nights. i hope the last half of the year picks things up.

posted by critically acclaimed @ 12:15 PM