The Change-Up

Movie: The Change-Up

Genre: comedy

Synopsis: Dave (Jason Bateman) is lawyer in a big law firm and is obsessed with making partner. He is married to Jaimie (Leslie Mann) and has three children.  His best friend is Mitch (Ryan Reynolds).  Mitch is a stoner with no ambition who acts in soft-porn movies.  They both think the other has a better life.  A magical fountain causes their minds to switch bodies.  They each now get to see the good things and the not-so-good things about each other’s life.

My two cents: This movie had a lot of good laughs, but caused me to cringe a few too many times. One example is when they show a baby playing with a blender and trying to stick his hand into the whirling blades.  Another was a scene with the two urinating in public in front of a bunch of girl scouts.  On the plus side, I thought Olivia Wilde, Dave’s legal assistant, stole just about every scene she was in.

   

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Friends With Benefits

Movie: Friends With Benefits

Genre: romantic comedy

Synopsis: Jamie (Mila Kunis) is a corporate headhunter in Manhattan.  Dylan (Justin Timberlake) runs an internet blog site.  Jamie is recruiting Dylan for a job at GQ magazine and brings him to Manhattan for an interview.  They strike up a friendship and discover that they both have failings in the relationship department.  They decide to become “friends with benefits” and no emotional entanglements. Naturally, complications ensue.

My two cents: This was a really fun movie.  Justin Timberlake continues to impress me with his acting and comedic skills.  I think Mila Kunis is poised to become a major star.  She is unbelievably cute and sexy and comes across as being smart as a whip.  The two seemed to have real chemistry. The actor who steals every scene he is in is Woody Harrelson as an enthusiastically gay editor at GQ. 

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Sarah’s Key

Movie: Sarah’s Key

Genre: historical drama

Synopsis: This is a French movie with English subtitle. Julia (Kristin Scott Thomas) is an American journalist living in Paris with her French husband and daughter.  They are moving into an apartment that her husband’s family has owned since 1942.  Julia works for a magazine and is writing an article about a little known period during the German occupation of Paris when French police rounded thousands of French Jews to be sent off to death camps.  Julia stumbles upon a connection between her husband’s family’s apartment and a Jewish family that was one of the ones sent off to the death camps.  The movie has two timelines that it follows, one follows Julia as she tries to unearth what happened to the family and what part her husband’s family played, the other is in 1942 and follows the Jewish family during their ordeal.

My two cents: I only stumbled upon this movie after hearing Kristin Scott Thomas interviewed on NPR’s Fresh Air.  The movie is absolutely gripping.  It brings to life the unspeakable horror experienced by the Jewish as they were rounded up – as husbands were wrenched from their families and then children wrenched from their mothers. This is one of those movies that everyone needs to see if for no other reason than so that the horror of the Nazis is never forgotten.  I can just about guarantee that you will not be leaving as soon as the credits start rolling . . . you will be sitting in your seat thinking about what you just saw.

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The Help

Movie: The Help

Genre: drama

Synopsis: Based on the book of the same name, this film is set in Jackson, Mississippi in 1963. Skeeter (Emma Stone) is a progressive, intelligent 20-something who recently graduated from college with a journalism degree.  She seems the only one in her circle of friends whose goal in life is not finding a husband and having children.  When one of her best friends, Hilly (Bryce Dallas Howard) starts talking about the need to have separate bathrooms for the black maids, Skeeter has a light bulb go on in her head.  She decides to write a book from the perspective of the black help – how they are treated, how their life is,…  The story chronicles how she convinces some of the maids to talk to – and provides a look at the life of a black maid, from the maid’s perspective.

My two cents: The book was amazing and this movie is equally amazing. The book and movie have both been criticized for trivializing the plight of blacks in that era.  From my perspective (that of a white man who grew up in an environment that provided almost no contact with blacks) this book and movie provided an eye-opening glimpse into what the cost of racism can be.  The blacks’ total lack of rights was appalling.  The scene that keeps coming back to me was when one of the maids (played by Viola Davis) is pushing a grocery cart down the right side of an isle of a grocery store (which she is only allowed to shop in if she is shopping for white people) and she encounters a white woman pushing a cart.  The only permissible response is for her to duck her head and move out of the way.  I still do not understand the mental process whereby it is considered to be okay for a black made to raise white children from birth, to clean the white people’s houses, to cook meals for white people – but any direct physical contact (such as the touch of a hand) is considered to be taboo.

In any case, the performances were standouts: Emma Stone as Skeeter, Bryce Dallas Howard as Hilly, Jessica Chastain at Celia Foote and Allison Janey as Skeeter’s mother; but the two best performances were Octavia Spencer Minnie Jackson and Viola Davis as Aibileen Clarke.  I would love to see this movie nominated for Best Picture Oscar . . .  and I am going to be shocked of Viola Davis does not pull down a nomination for Best Actress or Best Supporting Actress.  She was absolutely amazing.

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