Review: “The Help”

“The Help” is a good movie that could have been a great movie, which for a critic can actually be more frustrating than watching a flat-out terrible movie. The reason is wasted potential and “The Help” never fully capitalizes on some outstanding performances and a compelling story.

First we’ll focus on the positive. “The Help” is based on the super-mega-best-selling novel that received a nice little boost from Oprah’s Book Club. It takes place in civil-rights-era Jackson, Mississippi where segregation is still the law of the day and African-American servants toil in dehumanizing conditions in the homes of the town’s white upper crust.

One of the products of the social elite is Skeeter Phelan (the lovely and charming Emma Stone), an educated woman who returns home from college with greater aspirations than making babies and playing bridge. Skeeter longs to be a writer and decides she wants to tell the stories of the local maids and the daily indignities they suffer. At first many of the housekeepers are reluctant to open up to a rich white girl, that is until the quiet, yet determined Aibileen Clark (Viola Davis in the defining performance of her career) and her best friend, the boisterous, headstrong Minny Jackson (scene stealer Octavia Spencer) step forward.

The trio must meet covertly as the mere discovery of their project could present some very real danger in the segregated South.
This relationship is the heart of the movie and the performances of these three women reveal so much tenderness, courage and heartbreak that they make the movie worth seeing all on their own.

Where “The Help” runs into problems is when Skeeter and the maids navigate the domestic social scene dominated by cliquish housewives. The queen bee of this circle is Hilly Holbrook (Bryce Dallas Howard) who is such a one-dimensional villain she might as well have been wearing a black hat and a swastika armband.

Director Tate Taylor bleeds any and all subtlety out of these scenes and goes for a lot of cheap laughs as he attempts to lighten the mood. There is one outrageous, gross-out moment that would be more at place in a teen comedy that Taylor goes to again and again to the point that it comes to dominate the last half of the movie. This would be like “True Grit” featuring the bean-eating scene from “Blazing Saddles,” and then that scene lasting for a third of the movie.

Even still, there are mostly good things to take away from “The Help,” including a couple of excellent supporting turns by Sissy Spacek as Hilly’s dementia-suffering mother, Cicely Tyson as Skeeter’s childhood nanny and Jessica Chastain as the social outcast who become’s Minny’s employer.

Keep your eye on Chastain, who also starred this year in “The Tree of Life,” as she is on the verge of a major career breakout.
Naturally the movie is a bit too long, but this is to be expected in the film adaptation of a popular novel as fans of the book want to see as many pages up on the screen as is possible.

In spite of all its flaws, “The Help” is a movie I have to recommend because any film that can find humanity while shining a bright light on this subject matter is certainly worth your while. Plus you can witness some tremendous acting performances to boot.

Still I can’t help but feel that this movie puts too glossy of a coat over one of the most shameful eras of American history as it plays out like “In the Heat of the Night” for the chick-lit set. “The Help” pulls its punches just when it has the audience on the ropes and makes you wish the filmmakers had been as brave as Aibileen and Minny.

“The Help” is rated PG-13 for thematic material.

Review: “The Change-Up”

I am the target demographic for “The Change-Up.” I am a 30-something family man with fond recollections of my days of sowing wild oats, an appreciation of raunchy comedies, positive views of Jason Bateman and Ryan Reynolds plus I’m nostalgic about the body-swap-movie craze of the 1980s. If I don’t love this movie, no one will.

Bad news everybody else, I only found fleeting moments of enjoyment while watching “The Change-Up” as this lukewarm comedy never seems to find its rhythm in spite of some genuine effort on the part of the two leads.

Bateman and Reynolds are two life-long friends at very different places in their lives. Bateman is a workaholic, married with a precocious daughter and a set of twin babies. His wife, played by Leslie Mann, barely sees him as he dedicates all of his time to making partner at his law firm.

Reynolds plays a complete slacker whose life is devoid of any meaningful relationships. He coasts by on his good looks and he considers a productive day one spent smoking pot and playing video games.

As is the case with all body-swapping movies (have there been enough of these to officially count as a genre?) each man sees the grass as being greener in the life of his friend and openly wishes he could take the other’s place.

Then thanks to some supernatural hokum (in this case, simultaneous urination into a magic fountain) both men wake up in the other guy’s body.

“The Change-Up” then plays out pretty much as you would expect. There are lots of outrageous situations and wacky misunderstandings that arise from such a high-concept predicament. Each man learns that while his own life may not be great, his buddy’s life isn’t so hot either. Then when they end up back in their own bodies they incorporate what they’ve learned into their own lives and we all go home better people.

The biggest problem with “The Change-Up,” aside from its beat by beat predictability is that it seems to have a hard time picking the appropriate tone. Director David Dobkin, best known for helming “The Wedding Crashers,” can’t seem to decide if he is making a bawdy, full-bore sex comedy or if he is making a sweet, sentimental family film. The result is like mixing chocolate with broccoli – just weird.

It is fun to see Bateman and Reynolds play against type after the switch, with Bateman going all manic and cocky, and Reynolds being dry and sarcastic. Mann gives a bold little performance herself as she manages to keep pace with the boys in all of her scenes.

Unfortunately though, there’s just not a lot in “The Change-Up” to get excited about. At best you’ll be slightly amused and at worst you’ll wish you could swap bodies with someone watching another movie.

“The Change-Up” is rated R for pervasive strong crude sexual content and language, some graphic nudity and drug use.

Review: “Friends With Benefits”

Last year director Will Gluck took on the teen-comedy genre with the very self-aware, very charming and very funny movie “Easy A.”

With a snappy script and an excellent cast Gluck was able to insert wit and depth into a class of movie not typically known for either.

Gluck has now set his sights on the romantic comedy by applying this same formula to the new movie “Friends With Benefits” and the results are almost as successful.

I say “almost” because there are some shortcomings to the movie, but I can’t lay the blame at the feet of anyone on the cast and crew.

Instead, the very clichéd conventions the movie is commenting on are still essential to the extremely familiar plot. So familiar in fact, that the exact same premise of two friends making a failed attempt at a relationship based entirely on casual sex has already appeared in 2011 in the passably bland Ashton Kutcher, Natalie Portman flick “No Strings Attached.”

So as much as I want to praise “Friends With Benefits” for its originality; boy and girl still “meet cute,” boy and girl still fall for each other, circumstances still conspire to keep boy and girl apart until the final scene where boy and girl come together to live happily ever after.

Of course without all these elements the movie would cease to be a romantic comedy and then any commentary on the genre would become moot. Curse you Catch 22s!

Anyway, our boy and girl this time around are Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis who have an undeniable spunky/sexy chemistry.

Timberlake plays Dylan, a website editor from L.A. who is lured to New York by headhunter Jamie (as played by Kunis) to interview for a job to become editor of GQ magazine. Dylan lands the job, the two become friends and before you know it we are off to the races with the “casual sex” plotline and all the predictable twits and turns that follow.

Fortunately for us though, not only are our leads extremely likeable, they deftly deliver the zippy dialogue scribed by Gluck and co-writers Keith Merryman and David A. Newman.

Also there to inject life into the script at every corner is an exceptional supporting cast of scene stealers. Patricia Clarkson plays a more emotionally damaged version of her maternally spacey role in “Easy A” as Jamie’s hippy-drippy mother.

We have a Jenna Elfman sighting as Dylan’s sweet and funny older sister who lives back in L.A. with their Alzheimer’s riddled father played by the always-brilliant Richard Jenkins. It is a scientific fact that the mere appearance of Jenkins makes any movie 63% better.

Then there is Woody Harrelson who would have stolen the movie if he were only given more screen time, as Tommy the boisterous, homosexual, sports editor at GQ. Timberlake deserves a lot of credit for wisely stepping back and letting Harrelson upstage him in their scenes together.

In actuality, it’s the restraint of the entire movie that winds up elevating it. While the subject matter is certainly adults-only “Friends With Benefits” doesn’t go for easy laughs with any big gross-out moments or outrageously uncomfortable situations.

Romantic comedies are perennially successful at the box office mainly because of the comfort of familiarity. People will never stop enjoying watching attractive people fall in love and because of that it is very easy for filmmakers to get away with being lazy and unoriginal.

There is nothing lazy at all about “Friends With Benefits” and while it’s not exactly blazing any new ground it at least deserves some credit for nudging the genre even just a tiny bit outside of its comfort zone.

“Friends With Benefits” is rated R for sexual content and language.

Now that the “Harry Potter” saga has come to a close, I present my personal ranking of each movie, from worst to first.

8. “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets” – Even at its low point the “Potter” films still have a certain charm, but this lightweight affair has little going for it other than a fun turn by Kenneth Branagh as narcissistic professor Gilderoy Lockhart.

7. “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” – Gets points for being the first movie in the series, loses points for having an identical plot structure as “Star Wars” and for director Chris Columbus (who also directed “Chamber of Secrets”). When Columbus walked away from the series it turned out to be a blessing as his “gee-whiz” directorial style would have played poorly as the kids – and the themes – grew up.

6. “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” – This fifth entry in the series was the book that translated the poorest to the screen and showed that while director David Yates (who helmed the last four films) was capable of presenting the material, he wasn’t going to be pushing it to any higher levels of greatness.

5. “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” – Basically a repeat of “Order of the Phoenix,” except Dumbledore dies at the end. As far as advancing the plot is concerned, we probably could have just combined the two movies and called it “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Filler.”

4. “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2” – A fitting final chapter with all the strengths and weaknesses of the series on display. Right at home in the middle of this list.

3. “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1” – Even though this counterpart to the grand finale doesn’t really answer any questions, I actually preferred its moody and atmospheric tone to the flash and bang of “Part 2.” This is the first time we realize that our trio of Harry, Ron and Hermione are all grown up as they are on their own, on the run and fighting their own battles.

2. “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban” – When director Alfonso Cuaron took over for Columbus he revolutionized the series. He pushed the boundaries of the material, introduced a new visual style and got the best, possible performances out of his young cast. This was the moment the series went from blockbuster distraction, to something with a lot more heart and depth. Plus it featured time travel and Gary Oldman to boot. What’s not to love?

1. “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” – In his only effort, director Mike Newell delivered the very best “Harry Potter” film by doing everything Curaon did, only with meatier material. With the Tri-Wizard Tournament as the film’s backdrop we get a focused plot and the debut (finally!) of Ralph Fiennes vamping it up as the supremely evil Lord Voldemort. The movie climaxes with the series’ first major casualty with the zapping of Cedric Diggory (Robert Pattinson, who would later awake to find himself playing a vampire in significantly worse movies). It is at this point that it becomes clear that the “Harry Potter” saga is playing for keeps and that our little wizards are going to have to grow up – and fast.