Ed's Review Dot Com

Annapurna Pictures,

Joaquin Phoenix, Scarlett Johansson, Amy Adams, Rooney Mara, Olivia Wilde, Chris Pratt, Matt Letscher, Portia Doubleday

Theodore (Joaquin Phoenix) is a lonely writer and a divorced man who still is hung up on his ex. An upgrade to his OS on the computer brings him a companion to talk to in Samantha (Scarlett Johansson), the voice of his new OS. Samantha is the first self aware artificial intelligence, and she offers a lot to Theodore who is really lonely and has a hard time adapting to being alone. But as he finds himself falling in love with this voice in his ear, he finds there are limitations to a cyber girlfriend and problems that he never thought existed.

Let’s face it, this is not intended to be a literal factual story. This is certainly an allegory, looking at the cyber world and those who get so attached to it, that they lose their life and merge with the machine. Some of this film is really silly. An odd attempt for Samantha to move from computer sex to real world actual sex is really stupid. That should have been cut, but I guess they needed something juicy for the previews or something. Theodore is really a nerd, and he’s not going to gain much sympathy. He’s dysfunctional, and delusional. In fact, Theodore isn’t that much different from the losers who sit in the strip bars every night burning hundreds and thousands of dollars buying attention to make themselves that the pretty girls really love them, and are not just after the money. Theodore thinks his OS loves him, and when he finds out the truth, I don’t think he ever comes to realize how pathetic he is.

I was definitely not blown away with Her. I was interested in the story after seeing the previews over and over again, but when I finally got to see it on DVD, I wasn’t overly impressed. Not that it’s bad, or horrible, or anything like that. I’m really glad that I watched it, as it was an interesting story, and thought provoking. But the whole thing Joaquin did with the “quitting show business and becoming a rap star” thing was so stupid and annoying, including the bizarre interview on the Jay Leno show. This was classless promotion of a stupid film, and Joaquin Phoenix stock in my eyes fell a lot over that series of unfortunate events. He became a quirky little strange man and perhaps a bit off his rocker. I think that spoiled him in other roles (Has he had any since then?). Then he does this quirky strange little man character again and again he looks a bit off his rocker. I guess that was part of the reason I was somewhat put off by this film. I found myself despising Theodore and wishing he would wise up. So that kind of spoiled my enjoyment of the movie. Furthermore, using Scarlett Johansson as the voice of Samantha was really off putting as well. There is no question who it is, and her voice is so very recognizable. Therefore instead of sexy disembodied voice, I thought of Samantha as Scarlett all through the film. I can see the attempt to make parallels to other situations and know I should not take it literally, but it just wasn’t that great of a story to begin with. So I wasn’t highly impressed with this film, and I don’t recommend it very highly. Of course, that just my opinion.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), Screen Gems, Misher Films,

Chloë Grace Moretz, Julianne Moore, Judy Greer, Gabriella Wilde, Michelle Nolden, Alex Russell, Portia Doubleday, Ansel Elgort, Samantha Weinstein, Max Topplin, Cynthia Preston

Carrie White (Chloe Grace Moretz) is a shy young girl being raised by a religious fanatic mother (Julianne Moore) who punishes her by locking her in a closet and making her pray all day. Carrie is curious, but doesn’t fit in with the rest of the kids and is made fun of all the time, but Carrie is trying to learn to control some supernatural powers that she has, and when she is pushed too far, all hell breaks loose in this remake of the Stephen King story that made into a 1976 movie and now being brought up to date.

I have often made the assessment that some movies don’t need to be redone. We used to call it remaking, but now they prefer to call it reimaging. To me, reimaging would be making a new physical copy of an old print, but it sounds better I guess. Well, this movie does get the new 2013 technology update that wasn’t there in 1976, but I think it was a lot better film without Twitter and Facebook and YouTube. Imagine Carrie’s embarrassment when her shameful incident goes viral! It was a lot simpler terrifying story in 1976, I would much rather watch that version of the story. Don’t get me wrong, Chloe Grace Moretz does a really good acting job, but it’s not really her fault. I had a hard time with Julianne Moore because I know her so well, and I just had a hard time buying her as the mean old mother that she was supposed to be. I suspect she did a good job too, but it wasn’t the right role for her I’m afraid. But the biggest problem is that they had so much fun with all the fake CGI stuff, and some of it was frightening (a car crash for example), that they didn’t pay much attention to the nuances of the story. Carrie was an innocent little girl, but a really nice kid that you could see asking to the prom for real, and then suddenly threw the switch and became an evil bitch. Likewise, Carrie’s Mom garnered so much sympathy that you actually end up feeling really sorry for her which is not supposed to happen. She had a rough childhood which helps explain why she was so wacky, and she had good intentions. This is all wrong.

There are some other examples of this miscasting that is similar in a way. Take the musical Camelot for example. Arthur is supposed to be a little boy who never grew up. The impish Peter Pan way he runs around hopping from table to chair is supposed to show us how much he was so childish, that he never could have been a husband to Guenevere. We are actually supposed to feel sorry for her and Lancelot as what happened was Arthur’s fault because he was such a childish little boy. But when they cast Richard Harris in the movie version of Camelot, we loved him. He was such a warm and loving character that we hated Lance and Jenny for the horrible thing they did to him.

In Carrie, the remake, we feel a lot of sympathy for Mom Margaret, and don’t like Carrie at all by the end. It’s kind of backwards, and doesn’t come off that way in the original. But those of us who were frightened by the original movie are old now, and millions on millions of people have never seen the film. This is a modern version of a really good Stephen King story, that should be told. So if you’re not, like me, going to keep comparing the old with the new, for heaven’s sake, watch this version and you’ll really enjoy it. But if you like good classic cinema, and if you can find the original version, in my opinion it’s far superior to this version. This one is for the new generation, and has a purpose. I’m stuck in the middle on this one, but I don’t want to totally discourage you from seeing it. It’s a darn good book.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog