Big Talk Productions, Columbia Pictures, Four by Two Films,

Sacha Baron Cohen, Mark Strong, Isla Fisher, Rebel Wilson, Gabourey Sidibe, Penélope Cruz

Two little boys were orphaned at a young age and lived together in an orphanage in Grimsby. They became separated for 28 years, and Nobby (Sasha Baron Cohen) got married and had 9 children and lived a silly life, while his long lost brother, Sebastian (Mark Strong) grew up to become MI-16’s most feared and highly rated assassin. When their paths cross accidentally, the set of on an adventure where every government agent is trying to kill Sebastian while Nobby tries his best to help, but becomes a huge obstacle to Sebastian’s chances to live through this.

Sasha Baron Cohen has built a reputation as the shock jock of modern comedy films. He out-grosses everyone and I don’t mean in the box office, but in just plain gross! This is the third, at least, after Borat and then Bruno. Borat was fresh and a rather clever put on of a movie that was pretty decent. But Bruno was a lot more silly and dumb, and the edge wasn’t there anymore. This is, in my opinion, the worst of the three. Now don’t think my opinion is based on the raunchiness of the gags, it’s that it’s very 14 year old boyish and most of the gags are really recycled old, old jokes. I think perhaps he’s thinking the 14 year old kids (who aren’t allowed in to see this anyway) haven’t heard those old jokes, but I think they probably have. We have scene after scene that is a rip off of old jokes. He seems to be scraping the bottom of the barrel here, and I’m not sure why it’s so hard. Perhaps Sasha B is trying too hard to do everything and is falling into the Eddie Murphy trap when he started trying to do everything from start to finish and ended up making a mess of things. And then we got stuff like Norbert! Perhaps he needs to let someone else so some of the work and concentrate on doing the comedy. This guy has a lot of talent, and can be really funny, but this film just seemed overly stupid and boring. The “gross” stuff (instead of real funny gags) are not shocking anymore in this day of porn on every smart phone. He can’t shock us anymore and needs to up the intelligence of his films a little bit. This was a waste of time for him, in my opinion, and I recommend you don’t spend your hard earned money to see this thing. There are a lot of cameos by fairly big stars, and I’m not sure why they chose to do this. Maybe they thought they were making another Borat or something.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

 


 

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Haven Entertainment, Minerva Productions, Sandia Media,

Leighton Meester, Gillian Jacobs, Adam Brody, Mark Feuerstein, Gabourey Sidibe, Abby Elliott

Sasha (Leighton Meester) and Paige (Gillian Jacobs) are BFFs. They have always been close and are still best friends although one is gay and the other is straight. But when Paige meets Tim (Adam Brody) and is instantly attracted to him Sasha is afraid their friendship will not survive. Then again, Paige is obsessed with finding the perfect girl for Sasha too which is not sitting well either. Can an unusual friendship survive the challenges?

You know, I didn’t expect much from this movie. I was pleasantly surprised. It’s not a classic piece of cinema, but for the genre it’s in, they pulled it off pretty good. Certainly Leighton and Gillian pulled off the friendship as well as any pair I’ve seen for a long time. This is a girls film, no doubt, but the friendship comes of as genuine. When a straight girl and a gay girl are best friends, there are some challenges with that, but on the other hand, as is shown well here, the same problems would exist if they were either both straight or both gay. When a guy and a girl are best friends, but not in a relationship, there is generally the tension of one of the other (usually the guy) wanting more out of the relationship. Well, there is that same tension here as well, although nothing really becomes of it. But on the other hand, they are not going gaga over the same guy all the time, so that drama is not a problem with their friendship. All in all, it’s a charming little tale of friendship more than anything else. I enjoyed the story, and though I don’t feel moved or changed from having watched it, it was a solid performance and a good deal of entertainment. I don’t have anything bad to say about this film, and it’s a pretty decent little friendship tale for girls.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

 

 

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Desperate Pictures, Orange Studio, Why Not Productions,

Shailene Woodley, Eva Green, Christopher Meloni, Shiloh Fernandez, Gabourey Sidibe, Thomas Jane

Kat Conner (Shailene Woodley) is a 17 year old girl, living at home with a Mom and Dad who don’t get along. Her mother, Eve (Eva Green) constantly bickers and belittles her father, Brick (Christopher Meloni) who just puts up with it. Kat’s only escape is her boyfriend Phil (Shiloh Fernandez) and her friends. Her Mother seems to be getting more and more disconnected when suddenly one day, she simply disappears. As time passes there is no trace of her and Kat is now off to college. On a break at home, Kat finds her father is moving on, finally, but she’s just not ready to let go.

This was a touching movie. The time frame is supposed to be late 80’s. Shailene sure picks some difficult projects to work on, but she’s done another great job in this performance. Her situation is really sad, with parents who have checked out, and a boyfriend who’s not really much help or support. This is a stark film. It doesn’t pull punches, and there’s a lot of realism in the storyline. Characters are well developed, and the story holds a few surprises. The story is told by Kat, who’s the narrator, and so we get the pieces from her point of view as she sees them. If another character were the focus, it could have been a wildly different story, but I think they filmmakers did an excellent job of getting the teen angst down right, and we can certainly feel for Kat and the difficulties she has to deal with on her own. This is not for the squeamish, as, like I said, it’s a stark realistic look at life, but I thought it was very well done, and I enjoyed it very much.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

 

 

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Film4, Blueprint Pictures, British Film Institute (BFI)

Colin Farrell, Sam Rockwell, Woody Harrelson, Christopher Walken, Abbie Comish, Tom Waits, Olga Kuylenko, Michael Pitt, Zeljko Ivanek, Gabourey Sidibe, Kevin Corrigan

Marty (Colin Farrell) is a screen writer. He’s busy working on a silly script for a movie called Seven Psychopaths, a story of seven crazy serial killers. But he wants it to be about love and peace, and not so much about killing. He has a bunch of kooky friends who are concerned about the progress and want to assist, but one of them steals the Shih Tzu who is loved more than anything by the gangster who own him, and he’ll do anything in the world to get it back. Marty gets pulled into the Los Angeles criminal underworld as his friends try to help, but just get things turning worse and worse.

This is one of those really silly movies, that is funny, but in a ridiculous way. Like Airplane perhaps, or any of the Naked Gun or Police Academy movies, these guys are just really stupid, but somehow it is funny throughout. They take absurd conclusions and then do stupid actions to promote their mistaken conclusions in the first place. Woody Harrelson as the gangster is silly enough, but then he has no problems with anything you do to him or his guys, but he prizes his dog over anything, even life itself. Then there are so many other side characters that pop up from time to time, that it’s a bit of a Muppet Movie type of a gangster film. Colin Farrell is really funny as the horrible screen writer who wants to pen a non violent serial killer story. He’s absurd to a hilarious degree. If I took the time to watch this film again, I may even rate it higher, as at the first viewing I kept thinking the movie was really stupid, but as a couple days have passes since I’ve seen it, I keep reflecting on it, and thinking perhaps I missed a lot of the humor the first time, and is seems better and better as I think back on it. If you like the kind of humor that is offbeat and surprisingly unique, you might really like this one. The more I think about it, the more I enjoyed it. It’s certainly off the beaten path, and though it just came out on video, it didn’t get much traction. But I have a feeling this might be a lot better as time passes and the right people find it.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

 

 

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Universal Pictures, Imagine Entertainment, Relativity Media

Ben Stiller, Eddie Murphy, Matthew Broderick, Casey Affleck, Michael Peña, Tea Leoni, Gabourey Sidibe, Alan Alda, Judd Hirsch, Nina Arianda

Josh Kovacs (Ben Stiller) is the manager of a posh Central Park building called “The Tower”. It is ritzy and he keeps everything running smoothly from the dog walkers to the doormen, to the cleaning ladies, to the elevator operators and everyone in between. He has a special client living in the penthouse on the top floor, a stock market mogul named Arthur Shaw (Alan Alda). Shaw is a market wizard, so Josh decides to invest the workers entire pension fund with him with the promise to triple it in a year. Needless to say, the workers aren’t too happy when the FBI shows up with a warrant for Mr. Shaw as he is major swindler and took all the money. The money that he owes the banks is enormous compared to the pittance that belongs to the Tower employees, but Josh decides that the expertise that they have makes it possible for them to break into Mr. Shaw’s apartment while he’s out to court and get their money back. He calls together a few friends, including petty thief Slide (Eddie Murphy).

Tower Heist is a pretty funny film. It’s not going to be hugely popular because it’s just not going to appeal to everyone, but the story is rather clever. Not as cerebral as Ocean’s Eleven, but it’s the same type of story in a way. But we get a really good look into the service people who provide the very rich with every indulgence possible. It’s also a chance to root for the underdogs against the evil doers. It’s got a lot of decent comedy and a lot of action, chases, and double crosses. All in all the cast seemed to have a great time with this film.

All that being said, it’s not perfect. It’s not near as funny as Meet the Parents, or nearly as clever as Night in the Museum, but for a simple little comedy, it fills the bill. It’s not Ben Stiller’s best work, but it’s nice to see Eddie Murphy being Eddie Murphy again. He’s still got it.

Maybe it’s worthwhile to hold off on this one until it hits DVD, but as I said upfront, I enjoyed it. It was a great escape for a while, and a lot of fun. I can identify with these guys!

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

 

 

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